Computational White Matter Atlas for Young Rhesus Macaques

Nagesh Adluru¹, Hui Zhang², Andrew S. Fox¹, Elizabeth Zakszewski¹, Chad Ennis¹, Anne Bartosic¹, Andrew L. Alexander¹, Steve Shelton¹, Ned Kalin¹

Brain imaging in non-human primates is becoming increasingly common for many experimental applications. Currently there is no publicly available DTI template for young Rhesus Macaques. It has been shown in human studies that using tensor-based registration and a population template can improve detection of WM differences. Representative DTI templates are also important for generating detailed white matter atlases. This work develops a high-quality DTI template using high-dimensional tensor-based image registration of a large sample of 271 young Rhesus Macaques. Several WM pathways were traced by performing tractography on the template. The atlas and the pathways will be made publicly available.