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The Effect of Slice Orientation on Auditory fMRI at the Level of the Brainstem

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Abstract

Although auditory information is processed in several subcortical nuclei, most fMRI studies focus solely on the auditory cortex and do not take brainstem responses into account. One common difficulty in obtaining clear functional brainstem recordings is due to heartbeat related motion, manifested in the rostro-caudal and in the ventro-dorsal directions in the contraction phase of the heart. The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of slice orientation on auditory functional magnetic resonance imagining (fMRI) measurements with respect to the pattern of brainstem oscillation. Fourteen healthy volunteers listened monaurally to modulated pink noise. Blood oxygenation level dependent (BOLD) contrast was performed with an echo-planar image (EPI) sequence using a 3T MRI system. Three different slice orientations were compared: approximately parallel, at 45°, and orthogonal to the brainstem. The standard deviation of the residuals, the effect size, the median t-values, and the number of activated voxels were calculated to quantify variability in activation between orientations. The data for the inferior colliculi indicated that a slice orientation with a 45° angle to the brainstem yielded the lowest sensitivity to motion (reflected in the standard deviation of the residuals). By contrast, the results did not suggest differences between the three imaging planes on the scanning of the auditory cortex. Findings indicate that the 45° slice orientation is the optimum orientation for accurate measurement at the upper brainstem level.

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Notes

  1. SPM99 (www.fil.ion.ucl.ac.uk/spm) was used because of the implemented MarsBaR toolbox (http://marsbar.sourceforge.ne) for defining the regions of interest.

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Acknowledgements

This manuscript is based on the doctoral dissertation of the author, under general supervision of Prof. Ir. Hendrikus Duifhuis, Department of Biomedical Engineering, Neuroimaging Center, University of Groningen, with additional assistance by Remco Renken, Ph.D., Esther Wiersinga-Post, Ph.D., and Hans Hoogduin, Ph.D., Neuroimaging Center, University of Groningen. The author wishes to thank Anita Kuiper from Neuroimaging Center for assistance in data acquisition.

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  1. Department of Psychiatry & Clinical Psychobiology, Faculty of Psychology, Institute for Brain, Cognition and Behavior (IR3C), University of Barcelona, P. Vall d’Hebron 171, 08035, Barcelona, Spain

    Lavinia M. Slabu

  2. Neuroimaging Center, Graduate School of Behavioral and Cognitive Neuroscience, University of Groningen, Groningen, The Netherlands

    Lavinia M. Slabu

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Correspondence to Lavinia M. Slabu.

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Slabu, L.M. The Effect of Slice Orientation on Auditory fMRI at the Level of the Brainstem. Brain Topogr 23, 301–310 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10548-010-0141-2

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10548-010-0141-2

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