Comprehensive Digital Atlas of the Macaque Brain

描述(申请人提供)：该项目将使研究人员能够通过网络将猕猴大脑研究的数据映射到一个完全分段的、高分辨率的、空间索引的、基于基本信息学和神经解剖学原理的三维脑图谱中。研究人员将能够可视化和量化特定基因表达的区域、大脑成像(功能MRI或PET扫描)揭示的激活区域、经典大脑结构和其他实验数据之间的重叠，例如包含特定类型神经细胞的区域，以及与某些其他大脑结构连接的区域。非侵入性成像技术现在允许科学家扫描整个大脑，寻找与特定心理现象相关的活动焦点区域。同样，现代基因组学允许对整个大脑进行快速筛选，以寻找基因表达的焦点区域。这类技术在分析大脑结构-功能关系方面大有可为，但它们并没有很好地揭示大脑皮层区域的解剖边界，以至于研究人员无法准确识别激活或基因参与的解剖位置。该项目将允许研究人员从3D数字图谱中生成任何角度和位置的大脑横断面模板，修改它们以匹配个体差异，并将它们覆盖在实验组织学、MRI或PET切片上，以显示这些技术看不到的结构的大致边界。该项目的信息学部分将合并核磁共振确定的地标边界，将面部照片和组织显微照片合并，以生成整个恒河猴(Macaca Mulatta)大脑的数字三维模板地图集。3D模型将存放在华盛顿大学国家灵长类研究中心的BrainInfo网站上。其他机构的研究人员将能够通过网络将各种类型的数据映射到地图集中，以便与其他机构映射的数据进行比较。因此，这些地图以及许多其他类型的大脑信息将与整个神经科学界共享。2)该项目的研究部分将是在非人类灵长类动物的大脑中绘制与某些人类精神疾病有关的基因的表达图谱。该项目将加快世界各地神经科学家之间新研究成果的交流，并将提高我们对自闭症和精神分裂症等疾病所涉及的大脑区域的理解。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): This project will enable researchers to map data from studies of the macaque brain over the Web into a fully segmented, high-resolution, spatially indexed, 3-dimensional brain atlas built on basic informatics and neuroanatomic principles. Investigators will be able to visualize and quantify the overlap between areas in which specific genes are expressed, areas of activation revealed by brain imaging (functional MRI or PET scan), classical brain structures and other experimental data, such as, areas containing particular kinds of nerve cells, and areas with connections to certain other brain structures. Noninvasive imaging technologies now allow scientists to scan the whole brain for focal areas of activity associated with specific psychological phenomena. Similarly, modern genomics allows rapid screening of the whole brain for focal areas of gene expression. Such techniques hold great promise for analyzing structure-function relationships in the brain, but they do not reveal the anatomical boundaries of cortical areas well enough for researchers to precisely identify the anatomical locations of activation or genetic involvement. This project will allow researchers to generate template cross-sections of the brain at any angle and position from a 3D digital atlas, modify them to match individual variation, and overlay them on experimental histologic, MRI or PET sections to show the approximate boundaries of structures not visible by those techniques. The informatics component of the project will merge landmark boundaries identified by MRI, block face photos and histological photomicrographs to produce a digital 3-dimensional template atlas of the entire rhesus (Macaca mulatta) brain. The 3D model will reside in the BrainInfo website at the National Primate Research Center at the University of Washington. Researchers at other institutions will be able to map a variety of kinds of data into the atlas over the Web for comparison with data mapped by others. The maps, as well as many other kinds of brain information, will thus be shared with the entire neuroscientific community. 2) The research component of the project will be to map in the nonhuman primate brain the expression of genes that have been implicated in certain human psychiatric disorders. This project will accelerate the communication of new research findings among neuroscientists the world over and will improve our understanding of areas of the brain involved in such disorders as autism and schizophrenia.