High-throughput morphologic phenotyping of the mouse brain with magnetic resonance histology

Neuroimage. 2007 Aug 1;37(1):82-9. doi: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2007.05.013. Epub 2007 May 18.

Abstract

The Mouse Biomedical Informatics Research Network (MBIRN) has been established to integrate imaging studies of the mouse brain ranging from three-dimensional (3D) studies of the whole brain to focused regions at a sub-cellular scale. Magnetic resonance (MR) histology provides the entry point for many morphologic comparisons of the whole brain. We describe a standardized protocol that allows acquisition of 3D MR histology (43-microm resolution) images of the fixed, stained mouse brain with acquisition times <30 min. A higher resolution protocol with isotropic spatial resolution of 21.5 microm can be executed in 2 h. A third acquisition protocol provides an alternative image contrast (at 43-microm isotropic resolution), which is exploited in a statistically driven algorithm that segments 33 of the most critical structures in the brain. The entire process, from specimen perfusion, fixation and staining, image acquisition and reconstruction, post-processing, segmentation, archiving, and analysis, is integrated through a structured workflow. This yields a searchable database for archive and query of the very large (1.2 GB) images acquired with this standardized protocol. These methods have been applied to a collection of both male and female adult murine brains ranging over 4 strains and 6 neurologic knockout models. These collection and acquisition methods are now available to the neuroscience community as a standard web-deliverable service.

Publication types

  • Research Support, N.I.H., Extramural

MeSH terms

  • Animals
  • Brain / anatomy & histology*
  • Databases as Topic
  • Dominance, Cerebral / physiology
  • Image Enhancement / methods*
  • Image Processing, Computer-Assisted / methods*
  • Imaging, Three-Dimensional / methods*
  • Magnetic Resonance Imaging / methods*
  • Mice
  • Mice, Inbred C57BL
  • Phenotype*
  • Sensitivity and Specificity
  • Software*