Image-guided neurosurgery - neurosurgical treatment of functional brain disorders by transcranial Magnetic Resonance-guided Focused Ultrasound
The aim of our project is the introduction of Transcranial Magnetic Resonance-guided Focused Ultrasound into clinical medicine for neurosurgical treatment of brain diseases in a fully non-invasive manner.
Magnetic Resonance-guided Focused Ultrasound (MRgFUS) uses high intensity ultrasound beams that are focused into a hotspot with a volume of only a few cubic millimeters where the heating is high enough to induce thermal tissue ablation. Target volume planning and online temperature mapping in the target volume are done using Magnetic Resonance Imaging methods.
In this project we aim to extend the use of existing MRgFUS technology to applications in the human brain by developing technologies and protocols for non-invasive treatment of different diseases through the intact skull. Transcranial MR-guided focused ultrasound (TcMRgFUS) will overcome severe limitations of even minimally invasive operation methods, e.g. the significant risk to damage surrounding healthy brain tissue during the penetration process to access the operation site.
The first clinical application for TcMRgFUS will be the neurosurgical treatment of functional brain disorders, such as Parkinson's disease, dystonia and tremors, neurogenic pain and tinnitus, neuropsychiatric disorders and epilepsy. In spite of obvious differences in clinical presentation, there is evidence that a distortion of the normal dynamics between thalamus and cortex, named thalamocortical dysrhythmia (TCD), is the underlying basic mechanism.
Theoretical understanding of TCD in terms of basic cellular and network oscillatory dynamics has allowed developing specific stereotactic targets in the medial thalamus, or in the pallidum that allow the retuning of brain rhythmicity without reduction of the thalamocortical function.
Conducting these surgical procedures non-invasively by using TcMRgFUS technology will require support by new advanced tools and significant methodological developments.
Sub Projects
Development of theoretical models to describe the thalamocortical system and thalamocortical dysrhythmia in terms of complex dynamical systems.
Conversion of the Morel atlas in a digital representation and full exploitation of its inherent potential to develop high-precision interventional planning tools.
Integration of an existing TcMRgFUS-prototype system into the clinical 3.0T MR-environment at the University Children's Hospital.
Demonstration of the feasibility of non-invasive treatment of functional brain disorders using TcMRgFUS technology.
Project Coordination
Last update on 2009-05-19.
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