Test-retest reliability of FreeSurfer automated hippocampal subfield segmentation within and across scanners

Publication date: Available online 21 January 2020Source: NeuroImageAuthor(s): Emma M. Brown, Meghan E. Pierce, Dustin C. Clark, Bruce R. Fischl, Juan E. Iglesias, William P. Milberg, Regina E. McGlinchey, David H. SalatAbstractThe human hippocampus is vulnerable to a range of degenerative conditions and as such, accurate in vivo measurement of the hippocampus and hippocampal substructures via neuroimaging is of great interest for understanding mechanisms of disease as well as for use as a biomarker in clinical trials of novel therapeutics. Although total hippocampal volume can be measured relatively reliably, it is critical to understand how this reliability is affected by acquisition on different scanners, as multiple scanning platforms would likely be utilized in large-scale clinical trials. This is particularly true for hippocampal subregional measurements, which have only relatively recently been measurable through common image processing platforms such as FreeSurfer. Accurate segmentation of these subregions is challenging due to their small size, magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) signal loss in medial temporal regions of the brain, and lack of contrast for delineation from standard neuroimaging procedures.Here, we assess the test-retest reliability of the FreeSurfer automated hippocampal subfield segmentation procedure using 2 S model scanners (a Siemens Trio and Prismafit Trio upgrade). T1-weighted images were acquired for 11 generally healthy younger participants (t...

Source: NeuroImage - January 23, 2020 Category: Neuroscience Source Type: research