DTI processing

June 8, 2009 12:36 PM

MRI - what tools are currently favored for DTI data processing?

I'm interested in which applications are currently favored in DTI postprocessing (image analysis and visualization). Thanks

posted by sero_venientibus_ossa to health & fitness (8 comments total)

Do you already have software for standard fMRI analyses? That might constrain the the DTI options you have. Free packages like SPM or AFNI have toolbox add-ons for DTI, but require you to have Matlab (SPM) or a version of Unix/Linux (AFNI). I believe Brainvoyager has DTI tools, but is expensive. For the record, I use SPM, but I've never done any DTI.
posted by logicpunk at 12:54 PM on June 8

This is a good place to start. Most of the software in there is what I would recommend. It kind of depends what you're doing though.. if you're just calculating fractional anisotropy you don't need as an elaborate setup than if you're doing tractography (MedINRIA looks pretty, but I've never used it). I've basically been able to do everything I needed to do with DTI scans with MRIcro, but YMMV.
posted by devilsbrigade at 12:57 PM on June 8

Forgot to mention, one of the best ways of figuring out what tools people are using is to look through citations for recently published journal articles. My bet is that you'll see a lot of SPM & MRIcro.
posted by devilsbrigade at 12:59 PM on June 8

Should also point out that MRIcro is mostly a format converter & viewer, but it can do some processing as well. One of these days I'll learn to think my posts through before I post.
posted by devilsbrigade at 1:02 PM on June 8

Jesus, last post, I swear. Remembering now that MRIcro was for the ROIs only, and we had a command-line tool do the actual FA & push it back to MRIcro. Also, Slicer has DTI stuff, and is free & fairly intuitive.
posted by devilsbrigade at 1:09 PM on June 8

Depending on your platform, and what kind of user you are, you may like Osirix
posted by Laen at 3:35 PM on June 8

Thanks for all the suggestions so far, I'll look into these.

Just to quickly address your comments, I'm interested in FA rather than tractography. I have access to Matlab and Linux, so SPM and AFNI are definite options. I have some experience with FSL but not for DTI, so I know that's an option too.

I've used Osirix for volume and surface rendering, but I wasn't aware that it could process DTI data. I'll have to check that.
posted by sero_venientibus_ossa at 4:04 PM on June 8

It's been a few years since I've used it but where I worked we used:FSL . I believe it's fairly standard/well supported etc.
posted by Erberus at 4:18 PM on June 8