g-Ratio weighted imaging of the human spinal cord in vivo
详细信息    查看全文
文摘
The fiber g-ratio is defined as the ratio of the inner to the outer diameter of the myelin sheath. This ratio provides a measure of the myelin thickness that complements axon morphology (diameter and density) for assessment of demyelination in diseases such as multiple sclerosis. Previous work has shown that an aggregate g-ratio map can be computed using a formula that combines axon and myelin density measured with quantitative MRI.In this work, we computed g-ratio weighted maps in the cervical spinal cord of nine healthy subjects. We utilized the 300 mT/m gradients from the CONNECTOM scanner to estimate the fraction of restricted water (fr) with high accuracy, using the CHARMED model. Myelin density was estimated using the lipid and macromolecular tissue volume (MTV) method, derived from normalized proton density (PD) mapping. The variability across spinal level, laterality and subject were assessed using a three-way ANOVA.The average g-ratio value obtained in the white matter was 0.76+/−0.03, consistent with previous histology work. Coefficients of variation of fr and MTV were respectively 4.3% and 13.7%. fr and myelin density were significantly different across spinal tracts (p=3×10−7 and 0.004 respectively) and were positively correlated in the white matter (r=0.42), suggesting shared microstructural information. The aggregate g-ratio did not show significant differences across tracts (p=0.6).This study suggests that fr and myelin density can be measured in vivo with high precision and that they can be combined to produce a g-ratio-weighted map robust to free water pool contamination from cerebrospinal fluid or veins. Potential applications include the study of early demyelination in multiple sclerosis, and the quantitative assessment of remyelination drugs.

© 2004-2018 中国地质图书馆版权所有 京ICP备05064691号 京公网安备11010802017129号

地址：北京市海淀区学院路29号 邮编：100083

电话：办公室：(+86 10)66554848；文献借阅、咨询服务、科技查新：66554700