Resting State fMRI of Acute Focal Ischemic Rat Brain

Yen-Yu Ian Shih¹, Hsiao-Ying Wey¹, Fang Du¹, Shiliang Huang¹, Qiang Shen¹, Kameel M. Karkar¹, Timothy Q. Duong¹

This study applied rsfMRI to probe acute focal ischemia in rat. During 15 mins acquisition, there were typically a few (3) epochs of spontaneous BOLD waves. Each wave showed 12% BOLD increases (at 7 T) and the duration was on the order of 2-3 mins. The BOLD wave started in the cortex, spread downward, grew in size, and ended in the striatum. These characteristic waves are likely associated with peri-infarct spreading depolarization. This method provides unique and clinically relevant information to probe tissue at risk, which may have long-term clinical applications.