Effect of skull resistivity on the spatial resolutions of EEG and MEG

Abstract

The resistivity values of the different tissues of the head affect the lead fields of electroencephalography (EEG). When the head is modeled with a concentric spherical model, the different resistivity values have no effect on the lead fields of the magnetoencephalography (MEG). Recent publications indicate that the resistivity of the skull is much lower than what was estimated by Rush and Driscoll. At the moment, this information on skull resistivity is, however, slightly controversial. We have compared the spatial resolution of EEG and MEG for cortical sources by calculating the half-sensitivity volumes (HSVs) of EEG and MEG as a function of electrode and magnetometer distance, respectively, with the relative skull resistivity as a parameter. Because the spatial resolution is related to the HSV, these data give an overview of the effect of these parameters on the spatial resolution of both techniques. Our calculations show that, with the new information on the resistivity of the skull, in the spherical model for cortical sources the spatial resolution of the EEG is better than that of the MEG.