Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI)

Though somatotypic representation within the face in human primary somatosensory cortex (S1) to innocuous stimuli is controversial; previous work suggests that painful heat is represented based on an "onion-skin" or segmental pattern on the face. The aim of this study was to determine if face somatotopy for brush stimuli in S1 also follows this segmental representation model. Twelve healthy subjects (nine men: three women) underwent functional magnetic resonance imaging to measure blood oxygen level dependent signals during brush (1 Hz, 15 s) applied to their faces.

Buprenorphine (BUP) is a partial agonist at μ-, δ- and ORL1 (opioid receptor-like)/nociceptin receptors and antagonist at the κ-opioid receptor site. BUP is known to have both analgesic as well as antihyperalgesic effects via its central activity, and is used in the treatment of moderate to severe chronic pain conditions. Recently, it was shown that intravenous (IV) administration of 0.2mg/70 kg BUP modulates the blood oxygenation level-dependent (BOLD) functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) response to acute noxious stimuli in healthy human subjects.

In this pilot study, we used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to study the effects of morphine in 8 healthy, opioid-naïve volunteers. Intravenous small-dose morphine (4 mg/70 kg) or saline was administered to volunteers undergoing a fMRI scan. Infusion of morphine, but not saline, elicited mild euphoria without aversive symptoms and resulted in positive signal changes in reward structures including the nucleus accumbens, sublenticular extended amygdala, orbitofrontal cortex, and hippocampus.

Analgesia is defined as loss of pain sensation without loss of consciousness; pain may be acute or chronic. Acute pain is well understood and can be controlled with currently available analgesics. Chronic pain, however, is not effectively controlled with current analgesics and side effect profiles often limit the use of these agents.

Drug development today needs to balance agility, speed and risk in defining the probability of success for molecules, mechanisms and therapeutic concepts. New techniques in functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) promise to be part of a sequence that could transform drug development for disorders of the central nervous system (CNS) by examining brain systems and their functional activation dynamically. The brain is complex and multiple transmitters and intersecting brain circuits are implicated in many CNS disorders.

The use of novel brain biomarkers using nuclear magnetic resonance imaging holds potential of making central nervous system (CNS) drug development more efficient. By evaluating changes in brain function in the disease state or drug effects on brain function, the technology opens up the possibility of obtaining objective data on drug effects in the living awake brain. By providing objective data, imaging may improve the probability of success of identifying useful drugs to treat CNS diseases across all clinical phases (I-IV) of drug development.

The general linear model (GLM) is a well established tool for analyzing functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) data. Most fMRI analyses via GLM proceed in a massively univariate fashion where the same design matrix is used for analyzing data from each voxel. A major limitation of this approach is the locally varying nature of signals of interest as well as associated confounds. This local variability results in a potentially large bias and uncontrolled increase in variance for the contrast of interest.

We studied a patient after amputation of an arm and found that in less than 24 h stimuli applied on the ipsilateral face were referred in a precise, topographically organized, modality-specific manner to distinct points on the phantom. Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) performed one month later showed that brush-evoked activity in the brain demonstrates objective signal changes which correlate with perceptual changes in the phantom hand. This finding in humans corresponds to the observations of immediate plasticity in cortical pathways described in animals, including primates.

BACKGROUND: Clinical impressions and preclinical work suggest that posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) might be associated with dysfunctional reward processing. To pursue this issue, we administered a validated passive-viewing monetary reward task during functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to subjects with chronic PTSD and to mentally healthy individuals.

The amygdala is a key brain region with efferent and afferent neural connections that involve complex behaviors such as pain, reward, fear, and anxiety. This study evaluated resting state functional connectivity of the amygdala with cortical and subcortical regions in a group of chronic pain patients (pediatric complex regional pain syndrome) with age-sex matched control subjects before and after intensive physical-biobehavioral pain treatment.