Synopsis: Diffusion functional MRI (DfMRI) has been proposed to detect neuronal activations more directly than BOLD-fMRI, but its sensitivity to cell swelling associated with neuronal activities remains less known. Numerical simulations suggest that oscillating gradient spin echo (OGSE) diffusion MRI is more sensitive to changes in cell size than conventional pulsed gradient spin echo (PGSE) diffusion MRI. In adult rat brain DfMRI experiments with forepaw stimulation, ADC measured by OGSE showed significant reductions during stimulation, and the reductions were significantly larger than those measured by PGSE, suggesting OGSE may be more sensitive to cell swelling associated with neuronal activation than PGSE.
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