Contact information
Websites
- FMRIB Physics Research
- FMRIB Analysis Research
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Oxford-Nottingham Biomedical Imaging (ONBI)
Centre for Doctoral Training
Research groups
Amy Howard
Postdoctoral Researcher
Combining diffusion MRI and microscopy to probe tissue microstructure
What can we learn from highly detailed microscopy images that can help us infer brain connectivity in vivo? My research considers different ways in which we can combine complementary data from both microscopy and diffusion MRI, to both validate and drive biophysical modelling of the brain tissue microstructure.
Recently, our focus has been on collecting an extensive dataset, the BigMac dataset, which combines in vivo MRI, extensive postmortem MRI and microscopy (polarised light imaging and histology) data from the same, single brain. This dataset provides an open access platform to interconnect microstructural features with MR signals throughout the brain. More details can be found in this manuscript detailing the first release of the data.
At FMRIB, my research spans both the physics and analysis groups and is co-supervised by Profs Karla Miller & Saad Jbabdi.
Interests include:
- In vivo & postmortem MRI
- Diffusion MRI connectivity & microstructure imaging
- Biophysical modelling & model validation
- Light microscopy: polarised light imaging & histological staining
- Quantitative analysis of histology (structure tensor analysis & cell segmentation)
- MRI-microscopy co-registration
- Data fusion / joint analysis of MRI and microscopy (e.g. hybrid tractography)
- Open data
Key publications
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An open resource combining multi-contrast MRI and microscopy in the macaque brain.
Journal article
Howard AFD. et al, (2023), Nat Commun, 14
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Estimating axial diffusivity in the NODDI model.
Journal article
Howard AF. et al, (2022), Neuroimage, 262
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An automated pipeline for extracting histological stain area fraction for voxelwise quantitative MRI-histology comparisons.
Journal article
Kor DZL. et al, (2022), Neuroimage, 264
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Post mortem mapping of connectional anatomy for the validation of diffusion MRI.
Journal article
Yendiki A. et al, (2022), Neuroimage, 256
Recent publications
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An open resource combining multi-contrast MRI and microscopy in the macaque brain.
Journal article
Howard AFD. et al, (2023), Nat Commun, 14
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Hippocampal connectivity patterns echo macroscale cortical evolution in the primate brain
Preprint
Eichert N. et al, (2023)
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Tensor image registration library: Deformable registration of stand-alone histology images to whole-brain post-mortem MRI data.
Journal article
Huszar IN. et al, (2023), Neuroimage, 265
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An automated pipeline for extracting histological stain area fraction for voxelwise quantitative MRI-histology comparisons.
Journal article
Kor DZL. et al, (2022), Neuroimage, 264
-
Estimating axial diffusivity in the NODDI model.
Journal article
Howard AF. et al, (2022), Neuroimage, 262