Prospective Motion Correction of Multi-Band Multi-Echo fMRI During Overt Speech to Localize the Language Network

The functional localization of language and other clinically relevant brain networks at the subject-level has been limited by fMRI artifacts such as head motion. These artifacts have forced task-based fMRI for functional localization to be designed around strict timing and strong constraints, such as silent reading in 20-second task-rest blocks. Such limits make experiments hard to follow by patients and not ecologically valid. Dealing with these artifacts, especially at patient level, has been challenging with standard fMRI methods. Here we combine the acquisition technologies of multi-echo fMRI, multi-band acceleration, camera-based prospective motion correction, and 7T MRI, to image canonical language and other networks during overt speech with 7T MRI using stimuli with complex language content with naturalistic timing.