Location of electric current sources in the human brain estimated by the dipole tracing method of the scalp-skull-brain (SSB) head model.

Using a realistic, 3-shell head model including the scalp (S), skull (S) and brain (B) with conductivity ratios of 1:1/80:1, respectively, the electrical activity in the human brain recorded by conventional electroencephalography was approximated by 1 or 2 equivalent current dipoles. The dipole locations and vector moments were estimated by minimizing the squared difference between the potentials actually recorded from the scalp and those theoretically calculated from the equivalent dipoles. The validity of this dipole tracing method (the DT of the SSB head model) was tested in patients with focal epileptic seizures undergoing presurgical evaluation with intracranial subdural strip electrodes. Weak currents were passed through 1 or 2 pairs of subdural electrodes to create artificial dipoles. The dipole estimations correctly distinguished between single and double generator sources, but there were certain dislocations of the calculated dipoles. The average error of dislocation was found to be 8.5 mm for the 1-dipole model. That for the 2-dipole model was 6 mm for one of the components and 18 mm for the other. It was concluded that the DT method of the SSB head model can be a valuable clinical tool in 3-dimensional localization of focal epileptic discharges in the human brain.