Automatic segmentation of the short association fibers of the fronto-parietal and insula brain regions

Abstract

Human brain connection map is far from being complete. In part, because the study of the superficial white matter (SWM) is a complex and unachieved task. Its description is essential for the understanding of human brain function and the study of the pathogenesis associated to it. In this work we applied an automatic white matter bundle segmentation based on the major gyri connected by them. We performed then a hierarchical clustering in order to subdivide some bundles. The method was applied to the data of 10 subjects obtained from high quality HARDI database, for the right and left hemispheres. We obtained three classes of bundles for the connections between the superior frontal and inferior frontal gyri, the precentral and postcentral gyri, the precentral and superior-middle-inferior frontal gyri; and the insula with inferior frontal and with the precental-postcentral gyri.