Protocol for Magnetic Resonance Imaging Acquisition, Quality Assurance, and Quality Check for the Accelerator Program for Discovery in Brain Disorders using Stem Cells

Objective The Accelerator Program for Discovery in Brain Disorders using Stem Cells (ADBS) is a longitudinal study focused on collecting and analysing clinical, neuropsychological, neurophysiological, and multimodal neuroimaging data from five cohorts of patients with major psychiatric disorders from genetically high-risk families, their unaffected first-degree relatives, and healthy subjects. Here, we present a complete description of the acquisition of multimodal MRI data along with the quality assurance (QA) and quality check (QC) procedures that we are following in this study. Methods The QA procedure consists of monitoring of different quantitative measurements using an agar gel and a geometrical phantom. For the already acquired data from human subjects, we describe QC steps for each imaging modality. To quantify reliability of outcome measurements, we perform test-retest reliability on human volunteers. Results We have presented results from analysis of phantom data and test-retest reliability on a human volunteer. Results show consistency in data acquisition and reliable quantification of different outcome measurements. Conclusion The acquisition protocol and QA-QC procedures described here can yield consistent and reliable outcome measures. We hope to acquire and eventually release high quality longitudinal neuroimaging dataset that will serve the scientific community and pave the way for interesting discoveries.