Hanzhang Lu1, Feng Xu1, Uma S. Yezhuvath1, Yamei Cheng1, Rani Varghese1
1Advanced Imaging Research Center, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, TX, USA
A critical prerequisite for fMRI to be possibly used for personalized disease diagnosis is that we have to understand and account for differences in fMRI signals across healthy subjects. Recently, much attention has been focused on the physiologic markers that can explain the inter-subject variations. Here we conducted visual-stimulation fMRI in a group of young, healthy controls and compared four potential modulators in explaining the variations in fMRI signals: baseline venous oxygenation, cerebrovascular reactivity, resting state BOLD signal fluctuation, and baseline CBF. It was found that these physiologic parameters in combination can explain up to 69% of the inter-subject variations.