CLEVELAND, Ohio — A team of Case Western Reserve University researchers and technicians used a mixed-reality platform to create what is believed to be the first interactive holographic “atlas” of the brain, the university announced Thursday.
Researchers from CWRU and other institutions across the country used Microsoft HoloLens to generate a holographic image of neural pathways in the human brain.
These animated holographic brain maps will allow surgeons to perform more precise brain surgery, especially during deep brain stimulation for Parkinson’s patients, said Cameron McIntyre, CWRU professor of biomedical engineering and leader of the Microsoft HoloLens project.
Researchers described the project as a blend of advanced visualization hardware, software development and neuroanatomy data.
Microsoft HoloLens combines physical and virtual reality. HoloLens users put on a headset that allows them to see holographic images as well as their real-world surroundings, McIntyre said. When Microsoft HoloLens headsets are linked together, brain scientists can examine the same image simultaneously.
“We thought that would be a great thing to put in the hands of scientists,” he said.
Mark Griswold, faculty leader of CWRU’s Microsoft HoloLens education-related initiatives, was also part of the project. Griswold directs the Interactive Commons, which helps faculty, staff and students use visualization technologies for teaching and research.
The CWRU project focused on understanding the structures located near the base of the brain that regulate thinking, emotions and movement. Basal ganglia are difficult to map with traditional methods because the neural pathways in that area of the brain are so small, McIntyre said.
Scientists from across the country came to the university for two sessions, held in 2018 and 2019, to work on this project, McIntyre said. They used a database of brain MRI images, collected by the National Institute of Health, as a starting point to build holographic renderings of anatomical detail of the basil ganglia and turn the renderings into HoloLens brain maps, McIntyre said.
HoloLens brain maps of specific patient brains have been created, but those results have not yet been published, McIntyre said.
In the future, researchers will be able to use the HoloLens projections to customize brain images for a particular patient’s brain, McIntyre said. Researchers are interested in building similar maps for other parts of the brain to help treat psychiatric disorders and epilepsy.
“This is building a foundation for new ways to map pathways in the brain,” McIntyre said.