1. Theory and Methodologies for Digital Context Understanding, National Key Basic Research Projects of China (973), the Ministry of Science and Technology of China, 2004-2009.
2. Computational Theory and Methodologies for Brain Imaging and Their Applications to Brain Diseases, the National Distinguished Youth Foundations of China, National Science Foundation of China, 2005-2008.
3. Investigation on Key Problems in Information Processing of Clinic Medicine, National Key Basic Research Projects of China (973), The Ministry of Science and Technology of China, 2003-2008.
4. Study of Human Uncertain Decision-Making with functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging, National Science Foundation of China, 2007-2009.
5. Computational Theory and Methodology of Diffusion Tensor Imaging, National Science Foundation of China, 2006-2008.
6. Ontology and Context Related Medical Image Distributed Intelligent Access, Regional Program ICT-Asia, Research Innovation, 2006-2008.

Computational Theory and Methodologies for Brain Imaging and Their Applications to Brain Diseases

Research Team: All Member of the RCCM
Sources of Funding: NSFC, and National Key Basic Research Projects of China (973)

This project envisions achieving the following two main goals: (1). Establish the computational theory and methodology for brain anatomical and functional imaging. (2). Establish a quantitative description of anatomical and functional abnormality of the human brain affected with Alzheimer Disease and schizophrenia.

Develop some reliable biomarkers for diagnosis and early detection of mental disorders.The research themes of this project are as follows,

1. Investigate the quantitative description of gray matter loss of cerebral cortex and hippocampus abnormalities of human brain affected with Alzheimer Disease and schizophrenia and reveal the relationships between functional abnormality and anatomical abnormality.
2. Study the default connectivity pattern difference between the normal human brain and the patients' brain affected with Alzheimer Disease and schizophrenia, and develop some reliable biomarkers for diagnosis and early detection of such mental disorders.
3. Studies on imaging genomics for Alzheimer Disease and schizophrenia, that is, studies on the relationships between functional and anatomical abnormality of the human brain affected with Alzheimer Disease and schizophrenia and some susceptible genes of Alzheimer Disease and schizophrenia.
   
   

Shape Analysis of Cerebral Cortex

Research Team: Cunlu Xu, Jiefeng Jiang, Lei Lin and Yuanchao Zhang
Sources of Funding: National Key Basic Research Projects of China (973)

The surface of the human brain has a very characteristic folded shape. Recent evidence has shown that patients with certain types of brain disorder, such as schizophrenia and epilepsy, have abnormally shaped brains. The reason for the abnormalities of shape, and indeed the reason why normal brains take the shape that they do, is poorly understood. The improved measures of brain shape, and the use of statistical and biomechanical models can provide insight into the development of the brain, and the causes of some brain disorders. In this project, we will develop the computing theory and algorithms for the shape analysis and measurements of cerebral cortex, especially on segmentation, reconstruction and thickness computation of cerebral cortex.

Registration of Multimodal Medical Images

The modalities of modern medical imaging can be classified into two categories: anatomical and functional. The information they provide can be complementary each other. It is very useful to align them and is very helpful for the doctors to diagnose in the clinic, to design the operation plan, to trace the changes of pathology and to evaluate the therapy. In order to get high accurate result of the registration, we will develop our similarity measurement using forward and inverse transformation and robust estimator. We'll adopt parallel algorithm to speed our calculation. The objective of this project is to establish the registration part of our intelligent assistant system of medical treatment.

Brain Network and Cognitive Disorders

This project investigate the difference of functional connectivity pattern and network organization architecture between the normal and the patients' affected by cognitive disorders such as Alzheimer Disease and schizophrenia, and develop some reliable biomarkers for diagnosis and early detection of such mental disorders.

Study of responsive brain computer interface based on near infrared reflectance spectroscopy

Many studies have shown that it is possible to trace speech perception by detecting the blood dynamics in some delicate task. The Near Infrared Reflectance Spectroscopy (NIRS) is one of Non-invasive and portable technology, which can be used to record the brain activity. Currently, we are exploring a new technology, that is, responsive brain computer interface based on near infrared reflectance spectroscopy. We hope that it can be helpful for some patients with severe brain damage to communicate with external environment.

Imaging Genomics for Neurological and Psychiatric Disorders

Research Team: Ming Fan, Yonghui Li and Xingpeng Jiang
Sources of Funding: National Key Basic Research Projects of China (973)

Neuropsychiatric disorders, such as Alzheimer's disease and schizophrenia, usually have strong genetic predisposition. Previous imaging studies indicated that patients had abnormal brain structure and function, both of which were controlled, at least in part, by gene. However, the mechanism of the genetic control to brain in neuropsychiatric disorder is unclear. This project aims at exploring this mechanism in schizophrenia and AD, which may provide basis for clinical early diagnosis, therapy and prevention. We used schizophrenia patients and normal controls as subjects and brain imaging and genetic techniques as main research methods, grouped both patients and controls according to their genotypes and compared brain structure, anisotropy of white matter and functional connectivity within different genotypes.