UTHSC researchers are part of a decades-long project to significantly improve brain imaging

After nearly 40 years of research, a team that includes two researchers from the University of Tennessee Health Science Center has published a process to improve the performance of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). This allows researchers to capture brain images at higher resolution than ever before.

As a result of this work, scientists are now able to create images showing unprecedented detail of cell types and connections between parts of the mouse brain. The researchers believe this has broad applications in studying human aging and neurodevelopmental diseases such as Alzheimer’s disease.

“The main goal was to make sure we had the technology that would allow us to do preclinical research more efficiently and with higher resolution. Professor Robert W. Williams, Ph.D. Department of Genetics, Genomics and Informatics.

Over 20 years ago, Dr. Williams collaborated with Dr. G. Alan Johnson, leader of the Center for Endomicroscopy at Duke University, who began a research project over 10 years ago. Dr. Williams and his UTHSC colleague, Dr. David Ashbrook, were tasked with providing applicable applications to Dr. Johnson’s research, which included six of his other colleagues at Duke. and one colleague each from the University of Pennsylvania, the University of Pittsburgh, Indiana University, and LifeCanvas Technologies.

In a recently published article Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, lead author Dr. Johnson, describes a two-step process for obtaining such sharp brain images. The high-computing pipeline fuses improved MR scanning, which allows scientists to map circuits in the brain, with light-sheet microscopy, which allows scientists to label groups of brain cells. Combining complementary technologies is a revolutionary way to get a clearer picture of what’s going on in your brain.

“As we do in both MR and light sheets, increased resolution allows us to get closer to where everything is happening in the brain,” says Dr. Johnson. “Having all the rest of the human brain population does not prevent us from concentrating near the operational unit of the animal model of interest.”

This process not only yields sharper images, but it also gives researchers much higher throughput. According to Dr. Williams, “Ten years ago, if he had tried to do this, he would have had one case a week. Dr. Johnson said he could handle two cases a day, but that’s serious. Enough to do some serious science.”

Although the technology will not be used to treat patients with neurodegenerative diseases, it is already being used to study these diseases. Dr. Williams created a mouse model of Alzheimer’s disease that meaningfully mimics Alzheimer’s disease in humans. Using this model, the researchers are investigating whether dietary changes can extend lifespan in people with intact cognitive function. Using new imaging techniques, the disease can be studied in mice in a way that Dr. Johnson described as “remarkably simple but remarkably robust.”

“If you do that study in a clinical population, you’re talking tens of millions to hundreds of millions of dollars,” he said. We can look at these diseases with an order of magnitude higher fidelity at a cost.”

The team’s success in improving brain imaging has opened the door to more advanced research in neurogenetics and “illnesses that matter to all of us,” Dr. Williams said. It is the culmination of decades of work by people from multiple organizations and disciplines, including neurogenetics and neurogenetics.

“When you have two very different areas of study, the sum is a lot more than the parts,” says Dr. Johnson. “We have two very different worldviews of his, two very different fields of study, but the fact that we were able to fuse them gives us an ability that others don’t. will give to

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