ACE NeuroImaging Laboratory
Principal Investigator
Resume
The Lab
Projects
Support
People
Publications
Research Interests
Presentations
Brain Imaging Tools
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Introduction

We are developing new techniques for structural and functional brain mapping and apply these techniques to examine normal and pathological changes in brain anatomy. We have advanced our tissue classification methodologies and developed `pipeline` procedures to create probabilistic maps of normal neuroanatomy or neuropathology. At the same time, we have continued to develop the methodology to automatically measure the cortical thickness and studied the genetic influence on cortical sulcation.

We developed a technique to correct for partial volume effects in the extraction of the cortical surface and hence generate more accurate 3D surfaces. We also extended our statistical techniques for analysis of fMRI, cortical surfaces morphology and brain shape descriptors. We have demonstrated a novel new technique which simplifies the functional mapping of cortical areas for visual cortex. This technique will next be applied in studies of sensory and higher cognitive mechanisms.

Our next step is to examine correlated changes in cortical thickness over time during normal development and aging as well as in specific brain disorders. Recent collaborative studies have shown a focal cortical thinning in entorhinal/perirhinal cortex in patients with Mild Cognitive Impairment and Alzheimer’s Disease which correlates with reduced performance on the MMSE memory task. We are now developing the techniques to identify correlated changes among brain regions which might reflect a disease-specific degenerative pattern. This general methodology will be applied first in Alzheimer’s Disease but it will be applicable in other disorders as well as in normal development and normal aging.

top of the pag

External Scientific Collaborations
  1. Drs. John Mazziotta (UCLA), Arthur Toga(UCLA), Peter Fox(U. of Texas) Human Brain Mapping Consortium Exchange of normative data and software for anatomical and functional neuroanatomical mapping of human brain.
  2. Dr. Karl Zilles University of Düsseldorf Anatomical brain mapping. Exchange of students, fellows, software.
  3. Dr. Ryuta Kawashima Institute of Development, Aging and Cancer (IDAC), Sendai, Japan Probabilistic neuroanatomy atlas ; exchange of students, software and data
  4. Dr. Jong-Min Lee Hanyang University, Seoul, Korea 3-D MRI-based quantitative analysis of human cerebral cortex. Exchange of sfotware, fellows
  5. Dr. Hilleke Hulshoff-Pol University of Utrecht 3-D MRI-based quantitative analysis of psychiatric disorders. Exchange of software, fellows
  6. Dr. Judith Rapoport National Institute of Mental Health 3-D MRI-based quantitative analysis of psychiatric disorders. Exchange of data, joint research
  7. Dr. Christian Spenger, Karolinska Institute, Sweden Database of Alzheimer’s Disease MRI
  8. Dr. Harald Hampel, Ludwig-Maximillian University, Munich, Cortical thickness in Alzheimer’s Disease
  9. Dr. Pedro Valdes-Sosa, University of Havana EEG database
  10. Dr. Jorge Riera, Tohoku University, Sendai, Japan Integration of fMRI, cortical surface, EEG data in visual processing
  11. Dr. Viji Ravindranath, National Brain Research Centre, New Delhi, India Indian Brain Imaging Research Network
  12. Dr. Mark Ellisman, University of California, San Diego High bandwidth collaboratory of 3D brain data
  13. Dr. Ivica Kostavic, University of Zagreb, Croatia Pediatric brain image analysis
Visiting Scientists
  1. Dr. David Hawkes, Guy’s and Thomas’ Hospital, London U.K. (March 1992 - September 1992)
  2. Dr. John Crossman, Guy’s and Thomas’ Hospital, London U.K. (November 1992)
  3. Dr. Graeme O’Keefe, Medical Physics, U. of Melbourne, Australia (January 1993 - March 1993)
  4. Prof. Shuqian Luo, Professor of Computer Science, Zhenzhou U., China (Apr. 1993 - Oct. 1993)
  5. Dr. John Absher, Bowman-Gray Medical School, USA (July 1993 - Aug 1993)
  6. Dr. David Banks, Florida State University, 3D visualization of MRI/PET data (2003)
  7. Dr. Ryoi Goto, Tohoku Universty, Sendai, Japan Study of human aging using structural MRI (2003)
  8. Dr. Jean-Francois Mangin, INSERM, Paris, 3D reconstruction of cortical sulci from MRI (2003-4)
  9. Dr. Cheng Wang, Shanghai University, China, Extraction of brain from 3D cranial MRI (2006)
  10. Dr. Simon Eskilden, Aalborg University, Denmark, Cortical surface extraction from MRI (2006)
  11. Dr. Michael Ewers, Ludwig Maximillian University, Germany, Cortical thickness analysis in Alzheimer’s Disease (2007)
  12. Dr. Irene Scholz, Juelich Brain Research Centre, Germany MRI analysis of aging brain (2007)
  13. Dr. Hartmut Mohlberg, Juelich Brain Research Centre, Germany Image analysis of digital histology (2007)
  14. Dr. Pedro Valdes, Yasser Aleman, Karel Morales, Cuban Neuroscience Centre, Havana, Cuba Brain Image Acquisition and Analysis methods (2007)
  15. Dr. Jiange Chen, Shanghai University, China, Resting-state fMRI analysis (2007)
  16. Dr. Andrew Reid, U. of Nijmegen, Netherlands, Cortical network analysis in white-matter vascular disease (2007)
  17. Dr. Eini Niskanen, U. of Kuopio, Finland, Cortical thickness analysis in Alzheimer’s Disease (2007)
  18. Dr. Andew Simmons, Kings College London, U.K. Databasing of Innomed Alzheimer’s Project (2007)
  19. Dr. Michela Pievani, U. of Brescia, Italy, Cortical thickness analysis in Alzheimer’s Disease (2007)
  20. Dr. Jose Manjon, U. of Valencia, Spain, Multivariate statistical analysis of MRI images (2008)
  21. Dr. Lu Zhao, Technical University, Tampere, Finland, Cortical morphological analysis (2009)
Alan C. EVANS, MNI/McGill University. All rights reserved. This page last modified: Wed, Aug 26, 2009