Abstract
In this work, we combined optogenetic tools with high-resolution blood oxygenation level-dependent functional MRI (BOLD fMRI), electrophysiology, and optical imaging of cerebral blood flow (CBF), to study the spatial correlation between the hemodynamic responses and neuronal activity. We first investigated the spatial and temporal characteristics of BOLD fMRI and the underlying neuronal responses evoked by sensory stimulations at different frequencies. The results demonstrated that under dexmedetomidine anesthesia, BOLD fMRI and neuronal activity in the rat primary somatosensory cortex (S1) have different frequency-dependency and distinct laminar activation profiles. We then found that localized activation of channelrhodopsin-2 (ChR2) expressed in neurons throughout the cortex induced neuronal responses that were confined to the light stimulation S1 region (<500 μm) with distinct laminar activation profile. However, the spatial extent of the hemodynamic responses measured by CBF and BOLD fMRI induced by both ChR2 and sensory stimulation was greater than 3 mm. These results suggest that due to the complex neurovascular coupling, it is challenging to determine specific characteristics of the underlying neuronal activity exclusively from the BOLD fMRI signals.
Original language | English (US) |
---|---|
Pages (from-to) | 553-561 |
Number of pages | 9 |
Journal | Journal of Molecular Neuroscience |
Volume | 53 |
Issue number | 4 |
DOIs | |
State | Published - Aug 2014 |
Keywords
- Hemodynamic
- Optical imaging
- Optogenetics
- Somatosensory cortex
- fMRI
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Cellular and Molecular Neuroscience