Acquisition of a 3-Tesla Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) Scanner for Functional Studies of the Human Brain

该奖项提供资金，允许华盛顿大学获得3T磁共振成像（MRI）扫描仪，用于基础科学脑成像研究。该仪器将被安置在健康科学大楼的专用MRI研究设施中，它将支持UW的30多个基础科学MRI用户的主要群体，他们正在进行的研究成功关键取决于获得3T MRI扫描仪。 这些多学科研究人员来自多个不同的部门，包括心理学、言语和听力科学、音乐、计算机科学、生理学和生物物理学、语言学、神经外科、神经病学、生物工程和放射学。因此，这个3T设施将为艺术和科学，教育，工程，医学，健康科学，公共卫生学院和研究生院（心理学）的神经科学研究人员提供校园范围的支持。除了目前的MR研究人员，还有许多其他神经科学家在华盛顿大学谁表示有兴趣使用3T设施为他们的研究时可用。 因此，增加一个3T MRI设备将扩大在UW的功能性脑MRI研究工作在未来。 它也将成为其他区域机构研究人员可以利用的资源。功能性脑成像（fMRI）是一种重要的新研究工具，用于定义大脑如何控制运动和认知任务，以及这些功能如何受到异常发育或疾病的影响。3T MRI将用于许多fMRI研究，其中一些包括视觉系统分析，以了解大脑如何同时处理各种类型的视觉输入，包括空间信息（位置）以及特征信息（颜色，形状，运动，方向等）来解释视觉场景。涉及语言和认知的功能磁共振成像研究将调查大脑如何在试错学习过程中编码成功和错误，以了解这些神经编码事件是否可以用来预测人们的学习效果。使用结构MRI和MR波谱（MRS）测量脑代谢物变化的神经成像将用于比较发育正常的幼儿与自闭症儿童的大脑。定量MRI/MRS分析灰质和区域体积和化学变化随时间的变化（3岁至10岁）将与行为发育变化相关，以解决有关大脑发育的时间进程及其与典型和非典型行为的关系的问题。华盛顿大学坚定地致力于跨学科科学和教育，强大的跨校园研究关系证明，此外，该中心还设有多个跨学科培训项目，如神经生物学和行为研究生项目，以及多个跨学科研究中心，如综合脑成像中心（IBIC）、学习和脑科学研究所（ILABS）、弗吉尼亚州梅里尔布洛德尔听力研究中心（VMBHRC）、人类发展和残疾中心（CHDD）和华盛顿国家灵长类动物研究中心（WaNPRC）。拟议的3T设施将在这一传统下运作，不仅为学科和跨学科研究提供新的机会，而且还为本科生和研究生培训，教育推广，招聘新的神经成像教师，以及女学生和研究人员的参与，以及那些代表性不足的群体。

This award provides funds to permit the University of Washington to acquire a 3T magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scanner for basic-science brain imaging research. This instrument will be housed in a dedicated MRI research facility in the Health Sciences building where it will support a primary group of over 30 basic-science MRI users at UW whose ongoing research success depends critically on access to a 3T MRI scanner. These multidisciplinary researchers originate from multiple different departments that include Psychology, Speech and Hearing Science, Music, Computer Science, Physiology and Biophysics, Linguistics, Neurosurgery, Neurology, Bioengineering and Radiology. Thus, this 3T facility will provide campus-wide support to neuroscience researchers in the Schools of the Arts and Sciences, Education, Engineering, Medicine, the Health Sciences, the School of Public Health and the Graduate School (Psychology). In addition to the current MR researchers, there are many other neuroscientists at UW who have expressed interest in using the 3T facility for their research when available. Thus, addition of a 3T MRI facility will expand the functional brain MRI research efforts at UW in the future. It will also be a resource accessible to researchers from other regional institutions. Functional brain imaging (fMRI) is an important new research tool used to define how the brain operates to control motor and cognitive tasks and how these functions may be affected by abnormal development or disease. The 3T MRI will be utilized for many fMRI studies some of which include visual system analysis to understand how the brain operates to simultaneously process diverse types of visual input that includes spatial information (location) as well as feature information (color, shape, motion, direction, etc) to interpret a visual scene. Studies of fMRI involving language and cognition will investigate how the brain codes successes and errors during trial-and-error learning to see whether these neural coding events can be used to predict how well people learn. Neuroimaging using structural MRI and MR spectroscopy (MRS) to measure brain metabolite changes will be used to compare brains of young children with normal development to those with Autism. Quantitative MRI/MRS analyses of grey matter and regional volumetric and chemical changes over time (age 3 to age 10) will be correlated with behavioral developmental changes to address questions regarding the time course of brain development and its relationship to typical and atypical behavior.The University of Washington is strongly committed to interdisciplinary science and education, as evidenced by strong cross-campus research ties, interdisciplinary training programs such as the Graduate Program in Neurobiology and Behavior, and discipline-spanning research centers such as the Integrated Brain Imaging Center (IBIC), Institute for Learning and Brain Science (ILABS), Virginia Merrill Bloedel Hearing Research Center (VMBHRC), Center on Human Development and Disability (CHDD), and Washington National Primate Research Center (WaNPRC). The proposed 3T facility will operate in this tradition, providing new opportunities not only for disciplinary and cross-disciplinary research, but also for graduate and post-graduate training, educational outreach, recruitment of new faculty in neuroimaging, and involvement by female students and researchers, and those from underrepresented groups.