Muscle Atlas Project

Every day we all use our muscles to function in our daily life. However, for patients who suffer from one of over 600 different muscle diseases, their muscle function is impaired, significantly reducing their quality of life. Although each muscle disease is rare, combined, they affect al large part of the population. Fortunately, treatments that slow disease progression are under development. Their efficacy is commonly evaluated with a functional assessment, which is variable, subjective, and lack sensitivity. The rarity of each condition and each patient’s uniqueness complicates treatment trials and increases the development costs of treatment.

Therefore, in recent years, quantitative Magnetic Resonance Imaging (qMRI) methods that allow non-invasive and quantitative evaluation of muscle architecture, status, and microstructure increased. The quantitative parameters derived are sensitive to detect changes in muscle and can provide an abundance of information. This website was started together with the muscle quality index project. On this website you will find information about projects related to quantitative muscle analysis aimed to describe muscle architecture, status, and microstructure. With the projects on the website we aim to link quantitative MRI measurements of muscle to muscle function. Quantitative analysis of muscle architecture and function can be used for evaluating the health and strength of the muscles and monitoring changes over time. This will lead to a better evaluation of disease progression and therapy in muscle disease.

If you have any projects related to these research questions and want to collaborate or have your research projects listed on this website please reach out!