Craniofacial Statistical Deformation Models of Wild-type mice and Crouzon mice

Crouzon syndrome is characterised by the premature fusion of cranial sutures and synchondroses leading to craniofacial growth disturbances. The gene causing the syndrome was discovered approximately a decade ago and recently the first mouse model of the syndrome was generated. In this study, a set of Micro CT scannings of the heads of wild-type (normal) mice and Crouzon mice were investigated. Statistical deformation models were built to assess the anatomical differences between the groups, as well as the within-group anatomical variation. Following the approach by Rueckert et al. we built an atlas using B-spline-based nonrigid registration and subsequently, the atlas was nonrigidly registered to the cases being modelled. The parameters of these registrations were then used as input to a PCA. Using different sets of registration parameters, different models were constructed to describe (i) the difference between the two groups in anatomical variation and (ii) the within-group variation. These models confirmed many known traits in the wild-type and Crouzon mouse craniofacial anatomy. Moreover, they showed new traits, not reported before.