Microdevice mediated functional brain imaging with high temporal and spatial resolution

项目摘要 目前基于电极的脑活动记录方法以及脑电和脑磁图，提供了很高的 时间分辨率，但仅限于数千个通道。功能核磁共振可以询问数百名 数千个并行的脑体素，但受血流动力学的限制，其时间分辨率约为 几秒钟。目前还没有同时达到高时间分辨率(毫秒级)的方法。 和高通道数(~106个通道)。 我们建议探索微电子设备与核磁共振的结合使用，以实现至少两个 与现有方法相比，组合的空间和时间分辨率提高了数量级。 在我们的方法中，4-500m规模的大量小型设备将分布在整个大脑中， 穿过大脑表面或通过血液，用来感知局部神经活动 电气检测。然后，这些设备将以如下方式主动干扰其本地磁环境 通过磁共振成像既可检测又可定位。该方法结合了高时间分辨率 具有MRI的高空间分辨率/覆盖率的电磁检测。两个核心的小说概念 在该建议中包括：1)可以使用微型设备来检测本地信号并仅输出本地信号 干扰，而不是直接与外部接收器通信；以及2)MRI可能是一种有效的 转播和定位这些信号的手段。 从长远来看，我们相信这种方法可以扩展到4m规模的数以百万计的设备上 在血液中，提供整个大脑的电活动的体积检测。作为一个中间目标 我们的目标是从整个皮质表面记录亚毫米尺度和10ms分辨率的神经活动， 同时在每个皮质柱处提供电活动的测量。

Project Summary Current electrode based approaches for recording of brain activity, as well as EEG and MEG, provide high temporal resolution, but are limited to thousands of channels. Functional MRI can interrogate hundreds of thousands of brain voxels in parallel, but is limited by hemodynamics to a temporal resolution on the order of seconds. There are no current methods that can simultaneously achieve high temporal resolution (ms scale) and high channel count (~106 channels). We propose to explore the use of microelectronic devices in conjunction with MRI, to achieve at least two orders of magnitude increase in combined spatial and temporal resolution over existing methods. In our approach large numbers of small devices on the scale of 4-500m will be distributed across the brain, either across the surface of the brain or through the blood, and used to sense the local neural activity through electrical detection. These devices will then actively perturb their local magnetic environment in a manner that is both detectable and localizable through MR imaging. This approach combines the high temporal resolution of electrical or magnetic detection with the high spatial resolution/coverage of MRI. Two central novel concepts in this proposal are: 1) that microdevices may be used to detect local signals and output only local perturbations, rather than communicate directly with external receivers; and 2) that MRI may be an efficient means of both relaying and localizing these signals. In the long term, we believe this approach may be scalable to millions of devices on the 4m scale circulating in the blood, providing volumetric detection of electrical activity throughout the brain. As an intermediate goal we aim to record neural activity at sub-millimeter scale and 10ms resolution from the entire cortical surface, providing a measure of electrical activity at every cortical column simultaneously.