Assessing interactions in the brain with exact low-resolution electromagnetic tomography

Philos Trans A Math Phys Eng Sci. 2011 Oct 13;369(1952):3768-84. doi: 10.1098/rsta.2011.0081.

Abstract

Scalp electric potentials (electroencephalogram; EEG) are contingent to the impressed current density unleashed by cortical pyramidal neurons undergoing post-synaptic processes. EEG neuroimaging consists of estimating the cortical current density from scalp recordings. We report a solution to this inverse problem that attains exact localization: exact low-resolution brain electromagnetic tomography (eLORETA). This non-invasive method yields high time-resolution intracranial signals that can be used for assessing functional dynamic connectivity in the brain, quantified by coherence and phase synchronization. However, these measures are non-physiologically high because of volume conduction and low spatial resolution. We present a new method to solve this problem by decomposing them into instantaneous and lagged components, with the lagged part having almost pure physiological origin.

MeSH terms

  • Brain / physiology*
  • Electric Conductivity
  • Electroencephalography
  • Electromagnetic Fields*
  • Models, Neurological
  • Neurons / cytology
  • Tomography / methods*