STRUCTURAL INFORMATION FRAMEWORK FOR BRAIN MAPPING

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The long term goal of this work is to develop an information system for organizing, visualizing and managing intra-operative cortical language mapping data, as a testbed for neuroscience information systems of the kind envisioned by the Human Brain Project. Language has been, and continues to be explored through many different approaches, and the integration and correlation of multimodality information is a prerequisite for the generation and testing of hypotheses that seek to explain the apparent variable patterns of cortical language maps. During the first two and half years of this project we have developed methods for mapping the intraoperative data onto a 3-D MR-based reconstruction of the patient's own brain, and have implemented these methods in a Web-based information system that combines visualization and mapping with a multimedia database. The mapping of surgical sites onto an individualized neuroanatomical reconstruction provides a key missing link between surgically-obtained stimulation mapping data and non-invasive functional imaging methods. In the proposed work we will build on the present system in order to develop improved informatics tools for generating and managing these 3-D maps, and will use these tools as a basis for comparing language data from multiple modalities and from multiple patients. The specific aims of this proposal are to develop and extend methods for: 1) mapping intra-operative cortical language data onto a 3-D MRI-based reconstruction of the patient's own brain, 2) managing language data in a Web-based multimedia information system, 3) integrating multimodality data from a single patient, and 4) integrating multimodality data from multiple patients, obtained both locally and from remote sites on the Internet.