Optogenetic fMRI sheds light on the neural basis of the BOLD signal

Blood oxygenation level dependent (BOLD) functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) is widely used as a measure of neuronal activity, despite an incomplete understanding of the hemodynamic and neural bases for BOLD signals. Recent work by Lee and colleagues investigated whether activating genetically specified neurons elicits BOLD responses. Integrating optogenetic control of specific cells and fMRI showed that stimulating excitatory neurons triggers a positive BOLD signal with conventional kinetics locally and delayed weaker BOLD signals distally.