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Abstract #2711

An Automatic and Subject-specific Method for Locus Coeruleus Localization and BOLD Activity Extraction

Hengda He1, Linbi Hong1, and Paul Sajda1,2,3,4
1Department of Biomedical Engineering, Columbia University, New York, NY, United States, 2Department of Electrical Engineering, Columbia University, New York, NY, United States, 3Department of Radiology, Columbia University, New York, NY, United States, 4Data Science Institute, Columbia University, New York, NY, United States

The locus coeruleus (LC) is a small nucleus in the brainstem whose function is integral to regulating cognitive arousal. Despite the LC’s importance in cognitive processing, localizing it in functional space is challenging. Here, we propose a method that uses both an atlas and subjects’ neuromelanin-sensitive MRI images to estimate LC BOLD activity. We show that the LC BOLD extracted with our method is more strongly correlated with trial-to-trial variability in baseline pupil diameter than comparable approaches, an important metric since non-luminance changes in pupil diameter have been shown to covary with LC electrophysiological recordings in non-human primates.

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