title: Postmortem imaging and neuropathologic correlations.
abstract: Postmortem imaging refers to scanning autopsy specimens using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) or optical imaging. This chapter summarizes postmortem imaging and its usefulness in brain mapping. Standard in vivo MRI has limited resolution due to time constraints and does not deliver cortical boundaries (e.g., Brodmann areas). Postmortem imaging offers a means to obtain ultra-high-resolution images with appropriate contrast for delineating cortical regions. Postmortem imaging provides the ability to validate MRI properties against histologic stained sections. This approach has enabled probabilistic mapping that is based on ex vivo MRI contrast, validated to histology, and subsequently mapped on to an in vivo model. This chapter emphasizes structural imaging, which can be validated with histologic assessment. Postmortem imaging has been applied to neuropathologic studies as well. This chapter includes many ex vivo studies, but focuses on studies of the medial temporal lobe, often involved in neurologic disease. New research using optical imaging is also highlighted.
authors.affiliation: Athinoula A. Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging, Department of Radiology, Massachusetts General Hospital, Charlestown, MA, USA. Electronic address: jean@nmr.mgh.harvard.edu.
authors.forename: Jean C
authors.initials: JC
authors.lastname: Augustinack
authors.affiliation: Athinoula A. Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging, Department of Radiology, Massachusetts General Hospital, Charlestown, MA, USA.
authors.forename: André J W
authors.initials: AJ
authors.lastname: van der Kouwe
mesh_terms: D003933:Diagnosis; D006801:Humans; D007091:Image Processing, Computer-Assisted; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging; D009422:Nervous System Diseases / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging*
keywords: MRI; cortical localization; entorhinal cortex; ex vivo; hippocampus; histology; pathology; perirhinal cortex; subfields; subregions