Development of Analysis Tools to Enhance Fetal Neurological Assessment

描述（由申请人提供）：在阿肯色州大学医学院，我们安装了世界上第一个专门为胎儿和新生儿评估设计和修改的脑磁图（MEG）系统。这个名为SARA（Squid Array for Reproductive Assessment）的非侵入性系统由151个主要的超导传感器组成，这些传感器可以检测来自身体的生物磁场。自SARA安装以来，在为发育中的胎儿开发临床神经评估工具的最终目标方面取得了重大进展。我们的第一个目标是进行诱发反应测量，并开发处理算法来提取对外部刺激的反应，即听觉和视觉。在经历了各种迭代的处理算法之后，发现通过正交投影消除干扰是鲁棒的并且相对容易自动化。该程序已在大量的胎儿记录中成功地进行了测试，并且似乎足以在可检测时提取对刺激的诱发反应。然而，自发脑活动的提取和分析一直更具挑战性，因为没有刺激锁定反应。目前用于评估和识别胎儿自发MEG的方法是基于对基于新生儿EEC的特征形态的时间轨迹的视觉检查。虽然我们已经证明了记录自发活动的可行性，我们需要改进胎儿自发脑模式的检测。该提案有两个具体目标，一个是通过使用先进的空间滤波处理方法来改善胎儿自发脑磁信号提取，另一个是将该技术应用于评估处于发展神经问题风险的特定胎儿组中的自发脑活动。我们特别想研究宫内生长受限（IUGR）胎儿，因为他们的宫内环境受损影响潜在的生长和大脑发育。将IUGR胎儿的自发脑活动特征与正常生长的胎儿进行比较。总体目标如下：1.利用先进的信号处理方法增强自发性胎儿脑磁图信号的检测。2.评估宫内生长受限胎儿的胎儿自发脑活动信号，因为它们存在不良神经发育结局的潜在风险。相关性：胎儿脑功能的评价是一个非常宝贵的目标，因为我们目前缺乏直接监测这些功能的手段。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): At University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences we have installed the world's first magnetoencephalography (MEG) system specifically designed and modified for fetal and newborn assessment. The non-invasive system called SARA (Squid Array for Reproductive Assessment) consists of 151 primary superconducting sensors which detect biomagnetic fields from the body. Since the installation of SARA, significant progress has been made towards the ultimate goal of developing a clinical neurological assessment tool for the developing fetus. Our first goal was to perform evoked response measurements and develop processing algorithms to extract the response to external stimulus i.e. auditory and visual. After going through various iterations of processing algorithms, interference elimination by orthogonal projection was found to be robust and relatively easy to automate. This procedure has been successfully tested in a large number of fetal recordings and appears to be adequate to extract evoked responses to stimuli when detectable. However, the extraction and analysis of spontaneous brain activity has been more challenging since there is no stimulus locked response. The current method for evaluating and identifying fetal spontaneous MEG is based on visual examination of time traces for characteristic morphology based on neonatal EEC. Although we have shown the feasibility of recording spontaneous activity, we need to improve the detection of the fetal spontaneous brain patterns. This proposal has two specific aims, one is to improve fetal spontaneous MEG signal extraction by using advance spatial filter processing methods and the other is to apply this technology to assess the spontaneous brain activity in a specific group of fetuses who are at risk for developing neurological problems. We particularly want to investigate intrauterine growth restricted (IUGR) fetuses since their compromised intrauterine environment affects potential growth and brain development. The spontaneous brain activity characteristics of IUGR fetuses will be compared to the fetus with normal growth. The overall aims are listed below: 1. Enhance the detection of spontaneous fetal magnetoencephalographic signals using advanced signal processing methods. 2. Assess fetal spontaneous brain activity signals in intrauterine growth restricted fetuses since they are at potential risk for adverse neurodevelopmental outcomes. Relevance: Evaluation of fetal cerebral functions presents a very precious goal since we currently lack the means to directly monitor such functions.