Characterization of U-shape streamline fibers: Methods and applications

• Type of Material: Article
• Authors: Tuo Zhang, University of Georgia; Hanbo Chen, University of Georgia; Lei Guo, Northwestern Polytechnic University; Kaiming Li, Emory University; Longchuan Li, Emory University; Shu Zhang, University of Georgia; Dinggnag Shen, University of North Carolina; Xiaoping Hu, Emory University; Tianming Liu, University of Georgia
• Language: English
• Date: 2014-07-01
• Publisher: Elsevier
• Publication Version: Author Accepted Manuscript (After Peer Review)
• Copyright Statement: © 2014 Elsevier B.V.
• License: Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 4.0 International
• Final Published Version (URL): http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.media.2014.04.005
• Title of Journal or Parent Work: Medical Image Analysis
• ISSN: 1361-8415
• Volume: 18
• Issue: 5
• Start Page: 795
• End Page: 807
• Grant/Funding Information: D Zhang was supported by China Government Scholarship.; L Li and X Hu were supported by NIH PO1 AG026423 and NIH R01 DA033393.; T Zhang was supported by ‘Scholarship Award for Excellent Doctoral Student granted by Ministry of Education of China’ and ‘Excellent Doctorate Foundation of Northwestern Polytechnical University’.; T Liu was supported by the NIH Career Award EB 006878; NIH R01 DA033393; NSF CAREER Award IIS-1149260; and The University of Georgia start-up research funding.; L Guo was supported by NSFC-61273362.
• Keywords: Science & Technology; BRAIN; WHITE-MATTER; Computer Science, Artificial Intelligence; Engineering; PATHWAYS; CONNECTIONS; TRACTOGRAPHY; DSI; Fiber shapes; Computer Science; ARCHITECTURE; Life Sciences & Biomedicine; HARDI; Engineering, Biomedical; Radiology, Nuclear Medicine & Medical Imaging; DTI; Computer Science, Interdisciplinary Applications; Technology; Shape analysis
• Research Categories: Computer Science; Health Sciences, Radiology; Engineering, Biomedical

Abstract

Diffusion tensor imaging (DTI), high angular resolution diffusion imaging (HARDI), and diffusion spectrum imaging (DSI) have been widely used in the neuroimaging field to examine the macro-scale fiber connection patterns in the cerebral cortex. However, the topographic and geometric relationships between diffusion imaging derived streamline fiber connection patterns and cortical folding patterns remain largely unknown. This paper specifically identifies and characterizes the U-shapes of diffusion imaging derived streamline fibers via a novel fiber clustering framework and examines their co-localization patterns with cortical sulci based on DTI, HARDI, and DSI datasets of human, chimpanzee and macaque brains. We verified the presence of these U-shaped streamline fibers that connect neighboring gyri by coursing around cortical sulci such as the central sulcus, pre-central sulcus, post-central sulcus, superior temporal sulcus, inferior frontal sulcus, and intra-parietal sulcus. This study also verified the existence of U-shape fibers across data modalities (DTI/HARDI/DSI) and primate species (macaque, chimpanzee and human), and suggests that the common pattern of U-shape fibers coursing around sulci is evolutionarily-preserved in cortical architectures.