Description:Despite widespread interest, the ability to image the thalamus and distinguish its different nuclei non-invasively has proved challenging with “conventional” imaging modalities. In recent years, however, promising observations have been reported with MRI approaches such as susceptibility-weighted imaging and white matter-suppressed T1-weighted imaging, especially at 7 Tesla. In this talk, I will provide an overview of currently proposed techniques, and then describe our first impressions from a comprehensive practical review testing these and other dedicated contrasts for thalamic imaging at 7T, acquired on the same individual brain, and compared against reference atlas information.
Bio: João Jorge pursued his PhD in Physics & Biomedical Eng. at EPFL, Switzerland, focused on 7T functional MRI and its combination with EEG. After graduation, he continued his research activities as a post-doc at the CIBM Center for Biomedical Imaging, during which he began exploring 7T MRI modalities to image the thalamus, particularly based on magnetic susceptibility. Currently, he is a research fellow at the Swiss Center for Electronics and Microtechnology (CSEM), leading a small team funded by the Swiss National Science Foundation. His research remains centered on 7T MRI, and particularly on structural imaging of the thalamus, and on functional brain imaging with simultaneous EEG-fMRI at high spatio-temporal resolution.
Twitter: @JoaoBiomed LinkedIn: João Jorge