Abstract #2127

Zhao F, Wang P, Kim S, Wang J, Tai C, Roppolo J, de Groat W

FMRI has been widely used to study brain functions. Although the volume of published literatures in brain functional MR imaging has grown dramatically over the past decade, the number of published studies of functional MR imaging of the spinal cord is limited, suggesting that significant technical challenges are associated with detecting the blood oxygenation levelCdependent (BOLD) effect in the spinal cord. In this study the spinal cord fMRI was performed in cat at 9.4T with the high sensitivity of CBV-weighted fMRI. Robust CBV responses within the gray matter of spinal cord were observed during the electrical stimulation of sciatic nerve. Spinal cord functional MR imaging is of great value in both basic research and clinical applications.