Apparatus and method for quantification of the mapping of the sensory areas of the brain

Abstract

Method and systems provide a tool to quantify sensory maps of the brain. Cortical surfaces are conformally mapped to a topological disk where local geometry structures are well preserved. Retinotopy data are smoothed on the disk domain to generate a curve that best fits the retinotopy data and eliminates noisy outliers. A Beltrami coefficient map is obtained, which provides an intrinsic conformality measure that is sensitive to local changes on the surface of interest. The Beltrami coefficient map represents a function where the input domain is locations in the visual field and the output is a complex distortion measure at these locations. This function is also invertible. Given the boundaries and the Beltrami map of a flattened cortical region, a corresponding visual field can be reconstructed. The Beltrami coefficient map allows visualization and comparison of retinotopic map properties across subjects in the common visual field space.