dMRI

dMRI (or diffusion MRI, diffusion-weighted MRI, DWI or DW-MRI) is an imaging method that uses the Brownian motion of water molecules to generate contrast in MR images. dMRI is a recent breakthrough in brain mapping allowing the visualization of cross connections between different anatomical parts of the brain. It allows noninvasive imaging of white matter fiber structure and in addition to mapping can be useful in clinical observations of abnormalities, including damage from stroke. It allows the mapping of the diffusion process of molecules, mainly water, in biological tissues, in vivo and non-invasively. Molecular diffusion in tissues is not free, but reflects interactions with many obstacles, such as macromolecules, fibers, and membranes. Water molecule diffusion patterns can therefore reveal microscopic details about tissue architecture, either normal or in a diseased state. A special kind of DWI, diffusion tensor imaging (DTI), has been used extensively to map white matter tractography in the brain.

See also

fMRI, EEG, PET

Papers

• Le Bihan, D. (2003). Looking into the functional architecture of the brain with diffusion MRI. Nature Reviews Neuroscience, 4(6), 469-480.
• Wang, L., Zhu, Y., Li, H., Liu, W., & Magnin, I. E. (2012). Multiscale modeling and simulation of the cardiac fiber architecture for DMRI. IEEE Transactions on Biomedical Engineering, 59(1), 16-19.
• Moseley, M. E., et al. (1990). Early detection of regional cerebral ischemia in cats: comparison of diffusion‐and T2‐weighted MRI and spectroscopy. Magnetic resonance in medicine, 14(2), 330-346.
• Cook, P. A., et al. (2006, May). Camino: open-source diffusion-MRI reconstruction and processing. In 14th scientific meeting of the international society for magnetic resonance in medicine (Vol. 2759). Seattle WA, USA.
• Tuch, D. S., Reese, T. G., Wiegell, M. R., & Wedeen, V. J. (2003). Diffusion MRI of complex neural architecture. Neuron, 40(5), 885-895.
• Hagmann, P., Kurant, M., Gigandet, X., Thiran, P., Wedeen, V. J., Meuli, R., & Thiran, J. P. (2007). Mapping human whole-brain structural networks with diffusion MRI. PloS one, 2(7), e597.
• Le Bihan, D., Poupon, C., Amadon, A., & Lethimonnier, F. (2006). Artifacts and pitfalls in diffusion MRI. Journal of magnetic resonance imaging, 24(3), 478-488.
• Jones, D. K., & Cercignani, M. (2010). Twenty‐five pitfalls in the analysis of diffusion MRI data. NMR in Biomedicine, 23(7), 803-820.

Books

• Johansen-Berg, H., & Behrens, T. E. (2013). Diffusion MRI: from quantitative measurement to in vivo neuroanatomy. Academic Press.
• Jones, D. K. (2010). Diffusion mri. Oxford University Press.