Can Spherical Deconvolution Give Us More Information Beyond Fibre Orientation? Towards Novel Quantifications of White Matter Integrity

Flavio Dell'Acqua¹, Andrew Simmons¹, Steven Williams¹, Marco Catani¹

In recent years Spherical Deconvolution methods have been applied to diffusion imaging to improve the visualization of multi-fibre orientation in brain regions with complex white matter organization. However, the potential to quantify white matter integrity with SD has not been explored. In this study we show that assuming a fibre response function based on a restricted diffusion model may lead to a better interpretation of spherical deconvolution results, relaxing the requirement of an exact knowledge of the fibre response and possibly help the development of new fibre specific indices of white matter integrity.