Summary
Objectives
: The study of neurovascular coupling greatly benefits from combined measurements
of neuronal and vascular signals. Two-step signal processing is developed to extract
parameters describing the coupling.
Methods
: Using a magnetometer in an extremely well shielded room a broadband magnetoencephalogram
was simultaneously measured with time-resolved nearinfrared spectroscopy during a
motor activity paradigm. The raw MEG and NIRS data were denoised separately using
independent component analysis.
Results
: After averaging the resulting signals showed motor activity-related changes. The
temporal correspondence between MEG and NIRS was assessed plotting a combined trajectory
and calculating a crosscorrelation. Compared to the MEG signal, at movement onset
the NIRS signal showed an onsetdelay in the range of seconds.
Conclusions
: Multi-variate signal pre-processing followed by temporal delay estimates demonstrated
the extraction of neurovascular coupling parameters.
Keywords
Direct current magnetoencephalography - near-infrared spectroscopy - independent component
analysis - cross-correlation - neurovascular coupling