Functional MRI and MR Spectroscopic Studies of Penicillin Induced and Kindled Sheep Models of Epilepsy

癫痫是最常见的神经系统疾病之一，影响人口的1-2%。许多癫痫患者对药物治疗没有反应，他们控制癫痫发作的唯一希望是手术切除导致癫痫发作的大脑部分。成功的手术在很大程度上依赖于精确定位癫痫病灶的能力，而目前可用的成像技术通常不可能做到这一点。功能磁共振成像（fMRI）是一项新技术，如果能够在癫痫发作时或附近对大脑进行成像，可以提高我们定位癫痫发作灶的能力。磁共振光谱（MRS）使我们能够检测到大脑中的代谢变化，这些变化可能在癫痫发作后30分钟内持续存在于癫痫发作开始的部位。我们研究的目的是更深入地了解这些核磁共振模式检测到的变化，以便我们能够学习将这些技术应用于人类癫痫患者。最终，它可能会帮助以前无法治愈的癫痫患者接受成功的手术，过上正常的生活。

Epilepsy is one of the most common neurological disorders, affecting 1-2% of the population. Many epilepsy patients do not respond to drug therapy and their only hope for seizure control is surgical removal of the part of the brain responsible for their seizures. Successful surgery is very much dependent on the ability to exactly localize the seizure focus and this is often not possible using the imaging techniques currently available. Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) is a new technique which may improve our ability to localize the seizure focus from which seizures arise, if the brain can be imaged at, or near, the time of a seizure. MR spectroscopy (MRS) enables us to detect metabolic changes in the brain which may persist at the site where seizures have begun for up to 30 minutes after the seizure. The aim of our research is to obtain a greater understanding of the changes detected with these MR modalities so that we can learn to apply these techniques to human sufferers of epilepsy. Ultimately it may help enable previously incurable epilepsy patients to undergo successful surgery and live normal lives.