Functional Transcranial Doppler (fTCD)
Functional transcranial doppler sonography (fTCD) is a neuroimaging tool for measuring cerebral blood flow velocity changes due to neural activation during cognitive tasks. Functional TCD uses pulse-wave Doppler technology to record blood flow velocities in the anterior, middle, and posterior cerebral arteries. Similar to other neuroimaging techniques such as functional magnetic resonance imaging or positron emission tomography, fTCD is based on a close coupling between regional cerebral blood flow changes and neural activation. Due to a continuous monitoring of blood flow velocity, TCD offers an excellent temporal resolution in comparison to other neuroimaging techniques. The technique is noninvasive and easy to apply. Blood flow velocity measurements are robust against movement artifacts. Since its introduction the technique has contributed substantially to the elucidation of the hemispheric organization of cognitive, motor, and sensory functions in adults and children. fTCD has been particularly useful for the study of cerebral lateralization of major brain functions such as language, facial processing, color processing, intelligence processing and gender-related differences. Moreover, most established neuroanatomical substrates for brain function are perfused by the major cerebral arteries that could be directly insonated.
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