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Challenges and Perspectives of Mapping Locus Coeruleus Activity in the Rodent with High-Resolution fMRI

The locus coeruleus (LC) is one of the most commonly studied brainstem nuclei when investigating brain–behavior associations. The LC serves as a major brainstem relay for both ascending bottom-up and descending top-down projections. Specifically, noradrenergic (NA) LC neurons not only connect global...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Zhou, Xiaoqing Alice, Jiang, Yuanyuan, Napadow, Vitaly, Yu, Xin
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2022
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9405540/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36009148
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/brainsci12081085
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author Zhou, Xiaoqing Alice
Jiang, Yuanyuan
Napadow, Vitaly
Yu, Xin
author_facet Zhou, Xiaoqing Alice
Jiang, Yuanyuan
Napadow, Vitaly
Yu, Xin
author_sort Zhou, Xiaoqing Alice
collection PubMed
description The locus coeruleus (LC) is one of the most commonly studied brainstem nuclei when investigating brain–behavior associations. The LC serves as a major brainstem relay for both ascending bottom-up and descending top-down projections. Specifically, noradrenergic (NA) LC neurons not only connect globally to higher-order subcortical nuclei and cortex to mediate arousal and attention but also directly project to other brainstem nuclei and to the spinal cord to control autonomic function. Despite the extensive investigation of LC function using electrophysiological recordings and cellular/molecular imaging for both cognitive research and the contribution of LC to different pathological states, the role of neuroimaging to investigate LC function has been restricted. For instance, it remains challenging to identify LC-specific activation with functional MRI (fMRI) in animal models, due to the small size of this nucleus. Here, we discuss the complexity of fMRI applications toward LC activity mapping in mouse brains by highlighting the technological challenges. Further, we introduce a single-vessel fMRI mapping approach to elucidate the vascular specificity of high-resolution fMRI signals coupled to LC activation in the mouse brainstem.
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spelling pubmed-94055402022-08-26 Challenges and Perspectives of Mapping Locus Coeruleus Activity in the Rodent with High-Resolution fMRI Zhou, Xiaoqing Alice Jiang, Yuanyuan Napadow, Vitaly Yu, Xin Brain Sci Opinion The locus coeruleus (LC) is one of the most commonly studied brainstem nuclei when investigating brain–behavior associations. The LC serves as a major brainstem relay for both ascending bottom-up and descending top-down projections. Specifically, noradrenergic (NA) LC neurons not only connect globally to higher-order subcortical nuclei and cortex to mediate arousal and attention but also directly project to other brainstem nuclei and to the spinal cord to control autonomic function. Despite the extensive investigation of LC function using electrophysiological recordings and cellular/molecular imaging for both cognitive research and the contribution of LC to different pathological states, the role of neuroimaging to investigate LC function has been restricted. For instance, it remains challenging to identify LC-specific activation with functional MRI (fMRI) in animal models, due to the small size of this nucleus. Here, we discuss the complexity of fMRI applications toward LC activity mapping in mouse brains by highlighting the technological challenges. Further, we introduce a single-vessel fMRI mapping approach to elucidate the vascular specificity of high-resolution fMRI signals coupled to LC activation in the mouse brainstem. MDPI 2022-08-16 /pmc/articles/PMC9405540/ /pubmed/36009148 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/brainsci12081085 Text en © 2022 by the authors. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Opinion
Zhou, Xiaoqing Alice
Jiang, Yuanyuan
Napadow, Vitaly
Yu, Xin
Challenges and Perspectives of Mapping Locus Coeruleus Activity in the Rodent with High-Resolution fMRI
title Challenges and Perspectives of Mapping Locus Coeruleus Activity in the Rodent with High-Resolution fMRI
title_full Challenges and Perspectives of Mapping Locus Coeruleus Activity in the Rodent with High-Resolution fMRI
title_fullStr Challenges and Perspectives of Mapping Locus Coeruleus Activity in the Rodent with High-Resolution fMRI
title_full_unstemmed Challenges and Perspectives of Mapping Locus Coeruleus Activity in the Rodent with High-Resolution fMRI
title_short Challenges and Perspectives of Mapping Locus Coeruleus Activity in the Rodent with High-Resolution fMRI
title_sort challenges and perspectives of mapping locus coeruleus activity in the rodent with high-resolution fmri
topic Opinion
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9405540/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36009148
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/brainsci12081085
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