title: Quantitative cerebral blood flow with optical coherence tomography.
abstract: Absolute measurements of cerebral blood flow (CBF) are an important endpoint in studies of cerebral pathophysiology. Currently no accepted method exists for in vivo longitudinal monitoring of CBF with high resolution in rats and mice. Using three-dimensional Doppler Optical Coherence Tomography and cranial window preparations, we present methods and algorithms for regional CBF measurements in the rat cortex. Towards this end, we develop and validate a quantitative statistical model to describe the effect of static tissue on velocity sensitivity. This model is used to design scanning protocols and algorithms for sensitive 3D flow measurements and angiography of the cortex. We also introduce a method of absolute flow calculation that does not require explicit knowledge of vessel angles. We show that OCT estimates of absolute CBF values in rats agree with prior measures by autoradiography, suggesting that Doppler OCT can perform absolute flow measurements in animal models.
authors.affiliation: Photon Migration Imaging Laboratory, MGH/MIT/HMS Athinoula A. Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging, Massachusetts General Hospital/Harvard Medical School, Charlestown, MA 02129, USA. vjsriniv@nmr.mgh.harvard.edu
authors.forename: Vivek J
authors.initials: VJ
authors.lastname: Srinivasan
authors.forename: Sava
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Sakadzić
authors.forename: Iwona
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Gorczynska
authors.forename: Svetlana
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Ruvinskaya
authors.forename: Weicheng
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Wu
authors.forename: James G
authors.initials: JG
authors.lastname: Fujimoto
authors.forename: David A
authors.initials: DA
authors.lastname: Boas
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D002560:Cerebrovascular Circulation / Q000502:physiology*; D051379:Mice; D051381:Rats; D017207:Rats, Sprague-Dawley; D013003:Somatosensory Cortex / Q000502:physiology; D041623:Tomography, Optical Coherence / Q000379:methods*