Researchers Compile 'Atlas' Of The Brain

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http://www.rense.com/general39/atlas.htm

 

 

Researchers Compile

'Atlas' Of The Brain

By Deena Beasley

8-8-3

 

 

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - A computerized " atlas " of the brain is for the first

time giving researchers and medical experts a map for unlocking the puzzles

of the mind.

 

The 10-year project " was born out of frustration, " said Dr. John Mazziotta,

chair of the department of neurology at the University of California, Los

Angeles, medical school. " Unfortunately, the brain is different in every

single person. There is a tremendous amount of variance. "

 

As a result, researchers and radiologists have essentially relied on their

own experience to measure brain activity or diagnose disease.

 

But the atlas, which the researchers recently started making available for

use, will allow specialists to compare a patient's brain with those in the

data base. This may enable them to detect crucial differences in the brains

of sick people and thus diagnose and treat them.

 

An international research consortium, led by Mazziotta and Dr. Arthur Toga,

director of UCLA's laboratory of neuro imaging, has so far gathered digital

images of 7,000 brains using technology such as magnetic resonance imaging

scans. The scans taken of the brains of people mainly between the ages of 20

and 40 are colorized, animated and otherwise enhanced.

 

The participants included healthy people as well as individuals suffering

from Alzheimer's, autism, schizophrenia and fetal alcohol syndrome.

 

" What scientists do is take things apart and study one little thing at a

time ... This atlas allows us to put it all together again, " said Toga, who

calls the brain " the last great frontier of human biology. "

 

The atlas, available on-line at http://www.loni.ucla.edu/ICBM, enables brain

experts worldwide to access four-dimensional details -- time as well as the

three dimensions of space -- of brain structure and function, descriptions

of how the brain changes as we age and how and where neurological disease

occurs.

 

The project is funded by a number of sources including the National

Institutes of Health.

 

MORE CONFIDENCE IN DIAGNOSIS

 

" Eventually, it will be used to compare against disease populations. It will

give clinicians more confidence in a diagnosis, " Toga said.

 

The project is comprised of high-definition structural maps of individual

brains based on age, race, gender, educational background, genetic

composition and other distinguishing characteristics. Layered over the

anatomical maps are animations of brain functions such as memory, emotion,

language and speech. Users can look at individual brain pictures, composite

pictures of subgroups by, for example, age or gender or as a composite of

all 7,000 participants.

 

Toga has overseen brain scans of hundreds of people who tested within a

typical range on measures such as blood pressure and pulse. Scans were taken

while the subjects were at rest and while they performed a series of tasks,

from focusing on a picture of a checkerboard to responding to sounds, to

capture how the brain responds to stimuli.

 

" The brain handles the challenge of thinking of and initiating a word, and

of understanding that word, differently. Execution of these tasks involves

complex circuitry throughout the brain, " said Mazziotta.

 

These differences between brains make it difficult to know what is normal

and what is not. The atlas is also expected to be a guide for brain

surgeons, who may not be able to actually view the critical areas in a

patient's brain.

 

The atlas project is promising, but it is too early to say how relevant it

will be as a medical tool, said Dr. Mony De Leon, director of the New York

University Center for Brain Health who is not connected with the atlas

project.

 

" It could be used as an indicator to tell you whether part of the brain is

outside of normal limits, but someone still has to interpret the results, "

he said.

 

" If a pattern can be reliably determined, it will be an advantage in

compiling evidence to demonstrate clinical relevance, " De Leon said.

 

The project " will probably never end, " said Toga. " The point is to continue

to refine and continue to add data. "

 

The consortium is in the process of expanding the data base to include

younger and older age groups as well as brain scans from people with various

neurological diseases.

 

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