Effects of Transcutaneous Electrical Acupoint Stimulation on Brain Function Explored with Independent Component Analysis / 中国康复理论与实践

ABSTRACT

Objective To explore fMRI data with independent component analysis (ICA) in order to investigate effects of transcutaneous electrical acupoint stimulation (TEAS) on brain function. Methods The experiment was performed on a whole-body 1.5 T GE Signa Excite MRI scanner with which the brain oxygenation level dependent (BOLD)/EPI images were acquired from a female traumatic brain injury patient. A block designed protocol was used. Both durations of rest and TEAS were 30 seconds. The data processing was performed with GIFT, Statistical Parametric Mapping 5 (SPM5) and MRIcro. Results from ICA and SPM were compared. Results Extended Infomax algorithm provided by GIFT found thirteen independent components (ICs), each of which contained a spatial map and a corresponding time course. The spatial maps associated with task-related ICs resembled the activation maps from SPM5 but were not totally identical. In addition, the time courses of these ICs differed from the shape of canonical HRF model used by SPM. Conclusion ICA is a good choice to investigate data and obtain prior knowledge before using model-based methods such as SPM.