2009 Winter Project Week Hageman UCLANSBrainLab

Return to Project Week Main Page

Key Investigators

• UCLA: Nathan Hageman
• UCLA: Arthur Toga, Ph.D

Objective

Preoperative mapping of the brain is an important step in tumor resection involving functionally critical areas of the brain. Visualization of the location of gray and white matter structures with respect to the tumor mass helps the surgeon plan an operative approach that will minimize post-operative deficits. While functional areas have successfully been localized via fMRI, recently diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) has been shown to be successful in localizing critical white matter structures as well. The neurosurgery department at UCLA has been using BrainLab to do this type of preoperative planning in tumor patients. The recent link of BrainLab to Slicer allows us to take advantage of the alogithms in Slicer in the clinical research setting. The goal of this project is to develop a successful link between BrainLab and Slicer for the UCLA neurosugery department to assist in preoperative planning of tumor resection.

Approach, Plan

• Establishment of successful link between Slicer and BrainLab for the UCLA neurosurgery department
• Clinical study of preoperative planning of tumor resection using Slicer methods

Progress