The development and future of perfusion fMRI for dynamic imaging of human brain activity

Arterial spin labeled (ASL), perfusion fMRI was developed nearly simultaneously with BOLD fMRI. The application of this technique in studies of human brain activity has grown slowly over the last twenty years, primarily because of the need to meet technical challenges in data acquisition and analysis. Even within these constraints, perfusion fMRI has been identified as a tool that is well suited to measure slow changes in neural activity and to examine individual differences in brain-behavior relationships. Major advances have been made in acquisition and analysis techniques during this time. With further, anticipated technical improvements, perfusion fMRI studies in humans are poised to gain the improved cortical spatial resolution that has been observed in animal studies. If achieved, these advances portend surprising future applications of perfusion fMRI, including multi-voxel pattern analysis.