Underlying the exquisite soft tissue contrast provided by magnetic resonance imaging are the inherent biophysical processes of relaxation. Through the intricate relationships between tissue microstructure and biochemistry and the longitudinal and transverse relaxa ...

Methods for quantitative imaging of the brain are presented and compared. Highly precise and accurate mapping of the absolute water content and distribution, as presented here, requires a significant number of corrections and also involves mapping of other MR parameters. Here, either T 1 a ...

The safe operation of both clinical and pre-clinical MR systems is critical. There are a wide range of potential MR hazards. This chapter covers both the theoretical background to issues of MR safety and the guidance on more practical issues. The main sources of information on national and interna ...

MRI offers the ability to visualise and measure blood flow in the human body non-invasively. MR angiography (MRA) provides images of the arterial blood vessels within the body and allows measurement of blood velocities along these arteries. Arterial spin labelling (ASL) is a method for measu ...

The combination of electroencephalography (EEG) with functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) forms a powerful tool for the investigation of brain function, but concurrent implementation of EEG and fMRI poses many technical challenges. Here, the motivation for combining E ...

Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) has had an essential role in furthering our understanding of brain physiology and function. fMRI techniques are nowadays widely applied in neuroscience research, as well as in translational and clinical studies. The use of animal models in f ...

In recent years, several reporter genes have been developed that can serve as a beacon for non-invasive magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). Here, we provide a brief summary of recent advances in MRI reporter gene technology, as well as detailed “hands-on” protocols for cloning, expression, and im ...

In this chapter, we introduce modern magnetic resonance imaging (MRI)-based mouse brain atlases. Although unable to match the resolution and specificity of their histology-based counterparts, MRI-based mouse brain atlases feature higher anatomical fidelity and can facilita ...

Recent developments in high-field MRI have provided opportunities to detect iron in human brain with much improved sensitivity. The combination of increased magnetic field strength with multi-channel detectors has made it possible to routinely obtain images at about 300μm resolu ...

Amide proton transfer (APT) imaging is a new MRI technique that detects endogenous mobile proteins and peptides in tissue via saturation of the amide protons in the peptide bonds. Initial studies have shown promise in detecting tumor and stroke, but this technique was hampered by magnetic fie ...

One of the greatest challenges to study the structure, function, and molecules in the living brain is that it is enclosed within the skull and difficult to access. Although biopsies are feasible, they are invasive, could lead to functional impairments, and in any case will only provide a small region ...

Sodium (23Na) imaging has a place somewhere between 1H-MRI and MR spectroscopy (MRS). Like MRS it potentially provides information on metabolic processes, but only one single resonance of ionic 23Na is observed. Therefore pulse sequences do not need to code for a chemical shift dimension, all ...

Magnetic resonance spectroscopy (MRS) and the related technique of magnetic resonance spectroscopic imaging (MRSI) are widely used in both clinical and preclinical research for the non-invasive evaluation of brain metabolism. They are also used in medical practice, although the ...

The laboratory mouse, with its genetic similarity to humans and rich set of tools for manipulating its genome, has emerged as one of the key models for experimental investigation of the genotype/phenotype relationships in mammals. Recent innovations have made MRI an increasingly popular ...

Gene action plays a role in neural cell migration, learning processes, stress response, drug addiction, cancer, mental health, psychiatric and neurological disorders, as well as neurodegenerative diseases. Studies also show that upregulation of certain gene activities in neurons ...

Inflammation is a key component of many neurological diseases, yet our understanding of the contribution of these processes to tissue damage remains poor. For many such diseases, magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) has become the method of choice for clinical diagnosis. However, many of the MRI ...

Nitroxyl contrast agents (nitroxyl radicals, also known as nitroxide) are paramagnetic species, which can react with reactive oxygen species (ROS) to lose paramagnetism to be diamagnetic species. The paramagnetic nitroxyl radical forms can be detected by using electron paramagn ...

Stem cell-based therapy has the potential to improve the prospect of patients suffering from many untreatable diseases. Applications of stem cells for therapy of neurological conditions, such as Parkinson’s disease, Alzheimer’s disease, multiple sclerosis, or stroke, are partic ...

Over the past decade, the advances in human brain magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) have significantly improved our ability to gain insightful information about the structure and function of the brain. One of the MRI imaging modalities that still awaits more comprehensive data mining is ma ...

Stroke is the third leading cause of death and the leading cause of long-term disability in the United States. Brain imaging data from experimental stroke models and stroke patients have shown that there is often a gradual progression of potentially reversible ischemic injury toward infar ...