Cerebrovascular Imaging in a Rodent Stroke Model

Cerebrovascular imaging and its anatomy are an important determining component of blood flow dynamics, the pathophysiology and severity of brain injuries after stroke. Currently, various tools and techniques are available for vascular network imaging in rodent stroke models like intravascular perfusion of carbon black ink (CB) and others. This technique is widely used for imaging and studying the blood vessels after stroke. These methods are simple, feasible, cost-effective, and often used with the combination of CB to provide effective validation of the anterior cerebral artery (ACA) and middle cerebral artery (MCA). During the intravascular perfusion, combined ink is injected into the thoracic aorta allowing it to disperse throughout all parts of the body along with the brain providing high-contrast cerebrovascular images. Furthermore, this mixed infusion allows capturing images with a smaller vessel diameter in a larger area of the vessel compared to perfusion with latex infusion. Intravascular perfusion of CB provides a high repeatability and measurement accuracy to visualize the cerebrovascular structure of the vessels. Given the above, this chapter offers a concise summary and brief historical reference of different imaging techniques. Moreover, it offers an overview of the available protocols for CB, to identify cerebral vascular architecture and the connection between ACA and MCA as well as anastomotic line study. It also describes the analysis of the macroscopic anatomy of the cerebral vessels.