Computational analysis of cerebral cortex.
BACKGROUND
Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) has been used in many in vivo anatomical studies of the brain. Computational neuroanatomy is an expanding field of research, and a number of automated, unbiased, objective techniques have been developed to characterize structural changes in the brain using structural MRI without the need for time-consuming manual measurements. Voxel-based morphometry is one of the most widely used automated techniques to examine patterns of brain changes. Cortical thickness analysis is also becoming increasingly used as a tool for the study of cortical anatomy. Both techniques can be relatively easily used with freely available software packages. MRI data quality is important in order for the processed data to be accurate.


CONCLUSIONS
In this review, we describe MRI data acquisition and preprocessing for morphometric analysis of the brain and present a brief summary of voxel-based morphometry and cortical thickness analysis.
Takao
Hidemasa
H
Department of Radiology, Graduate School of Medicine, University of Tokyo, 7-3-1 Hongo, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo, 113-8655, Japan. takaoh-tky@umin.ac.jp
Abe
Osamu
O
Ohtomo
Kuni
K
D000465:Algorithms; D016477:Artifacts; D002540:Cerebral Cortex / Q000033:anatomy & histology*; D006801:Humans; D007091:Image Processing, Computer-Assisted / Q000379:methods*; D021621:Imaging, Three-Dimensional / Q000379:methods*; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging / Q000379:methods*; D008432:Mathematical Computing; D009929:Organ Size / Q000502:physiology; D012984:Software