Elsevier releases NeuroApps: MRI Atlas of Human White Matter

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Mar 12 2012

Elsevier, a world-leading provider of scientific, technical and medical information products and services, today announced the release of NeuroApps: MRI Atlas of Human White Matter, the first in a new series of apps created for the iPad™. Based on the MRI Atlas of White Matter by Kenichi Oishi, Andreia V. Faria, Peter C M van Zijl and Susumu Mori, this interactive application re-makes the atlas for a new generation of neuroscience researchers, clinicians and students.

“Digital media, particularly the new generation of tablets, have created a platform perfectly suited to high visual book content”

"It is an honor for Elsevier to build, on the work of these groundbreaking neuroscience researchers, a truly interactive application for the iPad™," said Suzanne BeDell, Managing Director, Science and Technology Books, Elsevier. "With this new product we hope to free researchers and others to work and study more nimbly and creatively."

Using NeuroApps: MRI Atlas of Human White Matter, the user is able to find, visualize, and learn to identify the major pathways through the brain and their proximity to key neuroanatomical structures. The app also allows the user to scroll through the brain in sequence to follow a tract from beginning to end. While based upon the images from the print book, in the app they have been digitally enhanced and the resulting 4-color images are much sharper on the iPad device which also allows image zooming for more detailed study.

"This platform allows us to interact with the contents of our atlas in a much more efficient manner," said Dr. Susumu Mori, one of the creators of the atlas. "It provides an intuitive graphics interface, which is often essential when we are exploring anatomy."

Available exclusively through iTunes™, the app has a full complement of functionalities:

Format allows viewer to compare coronal, horizontal, and sagittal sections in one view
Two types of stereotaxic coordinates (Talairach and MNI coordinates) are provided to define brain locations.
Includes both MRI and DTI images and allows the user to switch between MRI and DTI view for any location in the brain
Fifty three white matter structures, 38 cortical areas, and 22 deep gray matter structures are defined and labeled. In addition, locations of 11 white matter tracts and 36 cytoarchitectonic areas are defined. These structures can be interactively superimposed on the MRI/DTI images.
The trajectories of the tracts can be followed sequentially through the brain

"Digital media, particularly the new generation of tablets, have created a platform perfectly suited to high visual book content," said David Marques, VP Business Development, Workflow Solutions, Science and Technology Books, Elsevier. "In addition to NeuroApps: MRI Atlas of Human White Matter, we have several other apps being developed based on classic Elsevier books including ChemApps: Strategic Applications of Named Reactions, which is publishing later in March and is based upon the book Strategic Applications of Named Reactions in Organic Synthesis by Laszlo Kurti and Barbara Czako. Soon after, Elsevier will release an app based upon Chemical Resistance Database, to be followed by apps based upon Pipeline Rules of Thumb, Fundamentals of Forensic Science, Molecular Biology, Computer Architecture, Television Production, Policing in America, and Photoshop for Photographers. These other apps will be released in the coming weeks and months."