During the last three decades, functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) using the endogenous blood oxygen level dependent (BOLD) effect for contrast has increased our understanding of the healthy and the diseased brain. While fMRI continues to evolve, its full potential for neuroscience research and clinical translation will not be achieved without greatly improved significance at the individual subject/patient level (as opposed to group comparison) and accuracy/repeatability across sessions, sites, platforms, and time. Dramatic improvements in fMRI are required in order to provide robust functional diagnostic information for individual subjects/patients and to allow physicians to take full advantage of emerging invasive and non-invasive neuromodulation therapies.
The aims of this proposal will accelerate deployment of next generation functional neuroimaging (NGFN) tools for greatly improved large-scale whole brain recording with significance at the level of an individual subject, dramatically reduced instrumental noise and without the current confounds of auditory, vibration, and gradient stimulation. This project will therefore have a significant impact on functional imaging and clinical translation and will, with further development, potentially lead to direct (neural current dipole) non-invasive recording of neuronal activity.
