title: Myths and truths in functional MRI: a basic guide for practitioners.
abstract: Since the first successful demonstration of primary visual cortex "activation" by Sokoloff in 1961, activation studies based on regional blood flow alteration became one of the gold standards for neuroscientific investigation. The rapid advancement of non-invasive imaging techniques provided an appropriate stage for the human application of this original method. Following the tremendous success of positron emission tomography (PET) utilizing O(15) labeled H(2)O (H(2)O(15)-PET), the magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) version, which is now referred to as functional MRI (fMRI), was introduced. fMRI is the method created based on the empirical observation that MRI exhibits spontaneous signal alteration associated with blood flow changes. It is now believed that the principle of fMRI is identical to H(2)O(15)-PET, namely, that it is blood flow based in accordance with the well-known Munro-Kellie doctrine which predicts a decline in cerebral venous blood volume secondary to an increase in cerebral arterial blood volume. The method is inherently qualitative and does not provide quantitative information regarding flow alteration. With the growing use of fMRI, however, exponentially increasing well founded criticism questioning the validity of fMRI data has been raised. The majority of validation issues arise during the process of obtaining raw images, which eventually provides raw numerical data for post-processing statistical analysis. This article provides a distillation of the essential knowledge necessary for the non-MR physicist fMRI investigator.
authors.affiliation: Center for Integrated Human Brain Science, Brain Research Institute, University of Niigata, 1 Asahimachi, Niigata 951-8585, Japan. tnakada@bri.niigata-u.ac.jp
authors.forename: Tsutomu
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Nakada
mesh_terms: D001931:Brain Mapping / Q000379:methods*; D006801:Humans; D007091:Image Processing, Computer-Assisted; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging / Q000379:methods*