X-ray computerized tomography (microCT) is critical for efficient volume electron microscopy}

对整个大脑进行成像需要大量的时间和资源。必须确保只有最好的样品通过运行多年的管道进行处理。用于纳米分辨率成像的样品制备在结果上并非没有一些可变性，这取决于初始条件中微小的、通常无法检测到的差异。为了选择最佳的染色和无伪影样品，研究人员使用x射线显微镜对整个样品进行成像，以获得1微米分辨率的体积。对于每个样品，这些体积的自动和目视检查是一种质量控制形式，可以选择最佳样品用于随后的纳米分辨率电子显微镜成像。从这些最佳样本的体积中，我们可以最好地绘制出所有神经元回路的突触接线图，并研究神经回路的结构如何与功能以及最终与行为控制有关。通过筛选许多样本以寻找最佳的、无伪影的样本，我们可以最好地利用可用的显微镜资源，降低数据存储成本，大大降低后处理成本，特别是在电路校对阶段，并提供一个完整的突触接线图或连接组，为研究神经回路的行为基础做好准备。这些卷和神经回路将被存入公共数据库，成为更广泛的研究界的资源，为未来的脑功能研究奠定基础，例如将精神疾病动物模型的回路与健康回路进行比较，以确定精神疾病的神经回路基础。

Imaging the whole brain requires considerable commitment of time and resources. Ensuring that only the best samples are processed through a pipeline that runs over multiple years is a must. Sample preparation for imaging at nanometre resolution is not without some variability in the outcomes, depending upon minor, often undetectable differences in the starting conditions. In order to choose the best stained and artefact-free sample, researchers image the whole sample using X-ray microscopy, to obtain a volume with 1 micrometre resolution. Automated and visual inspection of these volumes, for every sample, is a form of quality control that enables choosing an optimal sample for subsequent imaging with electron microscopy at nanometre resolution. From the volumes of these optimal samples, we can then best map the synaptic wiring diagram of all the neuronal circuits contained within, and study how the structure of a neural circuit relates to the function and, ultimately, to the control of behaviour. By screening many samples in search of an optimal, artefact-free sample, we can best utilize available microscopy resources, reduce data storage costs, greatly reduce post-processing costs particularly at the circuit proofreading stage, and deliver a complete synaptic wiring diagram, or connectome, ready for studying the neural circuit basis of behaviour. Such volumes and neural circuits will be deposited in public databases to become a resource for the broader research community, establishing foundational work on which to base future studies of brain function, such as studies where the circuits of animal models of mental disease are compared with the healthy circuits to identify the neural circuit basis of mental disease.