3-D Measurements of Acceleration-Induced Brain Deformation via Harmonic Phase Analysis and Finite-Element Models

Objective:
To obtain dense spatiotemporal measurements of brain deformation from two distinct but complementary head motion experiments: linear and rotational accelerations.
Methods:
This study introduces a strategy for integrating harmonic phase analysis of tagged magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and finite-element models to extract mechanically representative deformation measurements. The method was calibrated using simulated as well as experimental data, demonstrated in a phantom including data with image artifacts, and used to measure brain deformation in human volunteers undergoing rotational and linear acceleration.
Results:
Evaluation methods yielded a displacement error of 1.1 mm compared to human observers and strain errors between
${\text{0.1}}\pm {\text{0.2}}{\% \,(\text{mean}\pm \text{std}.\,\text{dev.)}}$
for linear acceleration and
${\text{0.7}}\pm {\text{0.3}}\% $
for rotational acceleration. This study also demonstrates an approach that can reduce error by 86% in the presence of corrupted data. Analysis of results shows consistency with 2-D motion estimation, agreement with external sensors, and the expected physical behavior of the brain.
Conclusion:
Mechanical regularization is useful for obtaining dense spatiotemporal measurements of
in vivo
brain deformation under different loading regimes.
Significance:
The measurements suggest that the brain's 3-D response to mild accelerations includes distinct patterns observable using practical MRI resolutions. This type of measurement can provide validation data for computer models for the study of traumatic brain injury.