Language
English
Publication Date
11-15-2025
Journal
Neuroimage
DOI
10.1016/j.neuroimage.2025.121554
PMID
41138791
Abstract
The increasing scale and complexity of neuroimaging datasets aggregated from multiple study sites present substantial analytic challenges, as existing statistical analysis tools struggle to handle missing voxel-data, suffer from limited computational speed and inefficient memory allocation, and are restricted in the types of statistical designs they are able to model. We introduce Image-Based Meta- & Mega-Analysis (IBMMA), a novel software package implemented in R and Python that provides a unified framework for analyzing diverse neuroimaging features, efficiently handles large-scale datasets through parallel processing, offers flexible statistical modeling options, and properly manages missing voxel-data commonly encountered in multi-site studies. IBMMA successfully analyzed a large-n dataset of several thousand participants and revealed findings in brain regions that some traditional software overlooked due to missing voxel-data resulting in gaps in brain coverage. IBMMA has the potential to accelerate discoveries in neuroscience and enhance the clinical utility of neuroimaging findings.
Keywords
Humans, Neuroimaging, Brain, Software, Image Processing, Computer-Assisted, Meta-Analysis as Topic, Big data. Mega-analysis. Meta-analysis. Neuroimaging. PTSD. Resting-state fMRI
Published Open-Access
yes
Recommended Citation
Steele, Nick; Huggins, Ashley A; Morey, Rajendra A; et al., "Image-Based Meta- and Mega-Analysis (Ibmma): A Unified Framework for Large-Scale, Multi-Site, Neuroimaging Data Analysis" (2025). Faculty, Staff and Students Publications. 5476.
https://digitalcommons.library.tmc.edu/baylor_docs/5476