Project

A high-resolution, sub-second and fast-sampled resting state fMRI protocol for a better disentangling of neural, hemodynamic, physiological and movement activity in BOLD signal

Code
G080925N
Duration
01 January 2025 → 31 December 2028
Funding
Research Foundation - Flanders (FWO)
Promotor-spokesperson
Research disciplines
  • Medical and health sciences
    • Neurosciences not elsewhere classified
  • Engineering and technology
    • Biomedical signal processing
    • Modelling and simulation
    • Data visualisation and imaging
Keywords
functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) hemodynamic response computational neuroscience
 
Project description

Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) is a powerful and widely used technique of brain imaging. Part of the reasons why it works so well are mirrored by its pitfalls, in particular the mapping between brain activity and measured signal, and the influence of movement. The project addresses these issues from two complementary angles: MR physics with a new protocol able to provide high temporal resolution, and signal processing and computational neuroscience with algorithms which will extract relevant information from the data and make them widely generalizable. We will provide methodological improvements to answer research questions regarding the nature of neuroimaging fingerprinting, the reliability of network analyses and high-order structure interpretation, which cannot currently be fully addressed given the limitation of the acquisition pipeline of rs-fMRI data. By innovating the current state of the art, we aim at providing a new standard and related toolboxes which pave the way of a new way of conceiving non-invasive functional acquisition and analysis of brain activity.