Welcome to the University of Wisconsin – Madison Applied Neuro MRI Lab. We are part of the Department of Medical Physics, the Department of Radiology MRI Research and the Department of Biomedical Engineering.
Our research is in the field of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) of the human brain. Our goal is the development of new MR methods to visualize the structure and function of the brain and to translate these methods to the hospital for clinical diagnosis.
One of the areas upon which we concentrate our research is functional MRI (fMRI). FMRI allows us to visualize both the temporal and spatial patterns of brain activity in response to different stimuli. We are particularly interested in the development of new analysis methods to improve our understanding of brain function.
In addition to analyzing brain activation, we are also developing techniques to explore brain connectivity using diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) and the concept of effective connectivity. As implemented in MRI, DTI is a noninvasive imaging technique that can be used to probe the intrinsic diffusion characteristics of tissue. Techniques for diffusion imaging are evolving rapidly. Diffusion MRI research has been shown to have important applications, especially in stroke, the effects of tumors, degenerative diseases and brain injury.
Effective connectivity describes the integration within and between functionally specialized areas of the brain. Regions of the brain are located using fMRI. Integration of these regions is achieved through the information gained from DTI. We explore the effective connectivity in a variety of large-scale neurocognitive networks using structural equation modeling.