Higher‐resolution MR elastography reveals early mechanical signatures of neuroinflammation in patients with clinically isolated syndrome
- 30 December 2015
- journal article
- research article
- Published by Wiley in Journal of Magnetic Resonance Imaging
- Vol. 44 (1), 51-58
- https://doi.org/10.1002/jmri.25129
Abstract
Purpose To assess if higher‐resolution magnetic resonance elastography (MRE) is a technique that can measure the in vivo mechanical properties of brain tissue and is sensitive to early signatures of brain tissue degradation in patients with clinically isolated syndrome (CIS). Materials and Methods Seventeen patients with CIS and 33 controls were investigated by MRE with a 3T MRI scanner. Full‐wave field data were acquired at seven drive frequencies from 30 to 60 Hz. The spatially resolved higher‐resolution maps of magnitude |G*| and phase angle φ of the complex‐valued shear modulus were obtained in addition to springpot model parameters. These parameters were spatially averaged in white matter (WM) and whole‐brain regions and correlated with clinical and radiological parameters. Results Spatially resolved MRE revealed that CIS reduced WM viscoelasticity, independent of imaging markers of multiple sclerosis and clinical scores. |G*| was reduced by 14% in CIS (1.4 ± 0.2 kPa vs. 1.7 ± 0.2 kPa, P < 0.001, 95% confidence interval [CI] [–0.4, –0.1] kPa), while φ (0.66 ± 0.04 vs. 0.67 ± 0.04, P = 0.65, 95% CI [–0.04, 0.02]) remained unaltered. Springpot‐based shear elasticity showed only a trend of CIS‐related reduction (3.4 ± 0.5 kPa vs. 3.7 ± 0.5 kPa, P = 0.06, 95% CI [–0.6, 0.02] kPa) in the whole brain. Conclusion We demonstrate that CIS leads to significantly reduced elasticity of brain parenchyma, raising the prospect of using MRE as an imaging marker for subtle and diffuse tissue damage in neuroinflammatory diseases. J. Magn. Reson. Imaging 2016;44:51–58.Keywords
This publication has 39 references indexed in Scilit:
- Towards an Elastographic Atlas of Brain AnatomyPLOS ONE, 2013
- Multiple sclerosis susceptibility loci do not alter clinical and MRI outcomes in clinically isolated syndromeGenes & Immunity, 2013
- Predictors of Conversion to Multiple Sclerosis in Patients with Clinical Isolated Syndrome Using the 2010 Revised McDonald CriteriaISRN Neurology, 2012
- In vivo measurement of volumetric strain in the human brain induced by arterial pulsation and harmonic wavesMagnetic Resonance in Medicine, 2012
- Multiple Sclerosis Lesions and Irreversible Brain Tissue DamageArchives of Neurology, 2012
- Demyelination reduces brain parenchymal stiffness quantified in vivo by magnetic resonance elastographyProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 2012
- Brain Viscoelasticity Alteration in Chronic-Progressive Multiple SclerosisPLOS ONE, 2012
- A reproducible evaluation of ANTs similarity metric performance in brain image registrationNeuroImage, 2011
- Magnetic resonance elastography of the brainNeuroImage, 2008
- Rating neurologic impairment in multiple sclerosisNeurology, 1983