MRI Study of Normal Brain Development

四家NIH研究所(NICHD、NIMH、NINDS和NIDA)联合发起了一项多中心研究，以促进我们对典型的健康儿童和青少年大脑发育的了解。这项研究招募了大约500名儿童，从婴儿期到成年期，他们在六年的时间里在美国各地的几个临床中心被观察到了不同的时间点。获取脑部磁共振成像(MRI)，并进行影像表现和标准化的神经心理测试。 在这个项目中，我们充当了扩散张量数据处理中心(DPC)。这需要处理和分析各个临床中心在研究过程中获得的所有弥散张量磁共振成像(DT-MRI或DTI)数据。在此之前，我们开发并实现了DTI数据处理流水线。具体地说，我们开发了用于排序、显示和联合配准扩散加权图像(DWI)的程序，DTI数据是从DWI计算出来的。图像配准过程完成了去除被摄体运动和涡流失真的影响以及仅用一个内插步骤将图像与给定模板对齐的任务，确保了最小的数据质量损失。我们还提出了一种新的策略来稳健估计扩散张量及其派生的量。我们解决了使用刚体和线性(仿射)变换将DTI数据注册到数据库中包含的其他结构MRI数据的任务。最近，我们讨论了纠正用于DTI的Echo-Planar DWI(DW-EPI)采集所产生的残余图像失真的任务。 我们已开发了一套数码影像处理软件(乌龟)，并已透过https://science.nichd.nih.gov/confluence/display/nihpd/TORTOISE网站向公众发放。该软件得到了积极的维护，注册用户数量不断增加。 Normal儿科脑MRI项目的所有扩散数据都已使用乌龟管道成功处理，并已存储在一个更大的科学界可以访问的数据库中。我们还从这些数据中制作了特定年龄的大脑图谱，并调查了几个大脑区域的发育轨迹。成像数据现在已经准备好与数据库中可用的认知和其他行为数据一起进行分析。

Four NIH Institutes (NICHD, NIMH, NINDS, and NIDA) jointly sponsored a multicenter study to advance our understanding about how the brain develops in typical, healthy children and adolescents. This study enrolled approximately 500 children, ranging from infancy to young adulthood, who were seen at different time points over a six-year period at several clinical centers around the U.S.. Magnetic Resonance Images (MRI) of the brain were acquired and the imaging findings and standardized neuropsycological tests were administered. In this project we served as a Diffusion Tensor Data Processing Center (DPC). This entailed processing and analyzing all diffusion tensor MRI (DT-MRI or DTI) data that were acquired by the various clinical Centers during the course of the study. Previously, we developed and implemented a DTI data processing pipeline. Specifically we developed procedures for sorting, displaying, and co-registering diffusion weighted images (DWI) from which the DTI data is computed. The image registration procedure accomplishes the tasks of removing the effects of subject motion and eddy current distortion as well as aligning the images to a given template with only one interpolation step, ensuring minimal loss in data quality. We also proposed a new strategy for robust estimation of the diffusion tensor and quantities derived from it. We addressed the task of registering DTI data to other structural MRI data contained in the database using rigid body and linear (affine) transformations. More recently we addressed the task of correcting residual image distortion originating from the Echo-Planar DWI (DW-EPI) acquisition used for DTI. We have developed a DTI processing software (TORTOISE) and have disseminated it to the public through the website https://science.nichd.nih.gov/confluence/display/nihpd/TORTOISE . The software is actively maintained and has an increasing number of registered users. All diffusion data from the Normal Pediatric Brain MRI project have been successfully processed using the TORTOISE pipeline and have been deposited in a database that is accessible by the larger scientific community. We have also produced age-specific brain atlases from these data and we investigated developmental trajectories for several brain regions. The imaging data are now ready for analysis in conjunction with cognitive and other behavioral data available in the database.