Cross-vendor and cross-protocol harmonisation of diffusion MRI data: A comparative study

Abstract

We present a comparison of five different methods that estimate mappings between scanners for diffusion MRI data harmonisation. The methods are evaluated on a dedicated dataset of the same subjects acquired on three distinct scanners with ‘standard’ and ‘state-of-the-art’ protocols, with the latter having higher spatial and angular resolution. Our results show that cross-vendor harmonisation and spatial/angular resolution enhancement of single-shell diffusion data sets can be performed reliably, although some challenges remain. The dataset is available upon request and can serve as a useful testbed for future method development in cross-site/cross-hardware and cross-vendor diffusion MRI harmonisation