Department of Cosmic Rays and Chronology, Institute of Physics Gleb Wataghin, University of Campinas, São Paulo, Brazil.
J Neuroimaging. 2012 Jan;22(1):46-52. doi: 10.1111/j.1552-6569.2010.00553.x. Epub 2010 Dec 1.
BACKGROUND/PURPOSE: Texture analysis (TA) is a branch of image processing, which attempts to convey "texture" information from digital images, such as magnetic resonance images (MRI). Machado-Joseph disease (MJD) affects mainly cerebellum and brainstem, but recent studies have shown that other cerebral structures may also be affected.
To investigate subtle structural abnormalities in corpus callosum (CC), thalami, putamen, and caudate nuclei of patients with MJD using TA.
Eighteen healthy volunteers and 18 patients with MJD were studied (mean age at disease onset = 34.7 years; disease duration = 9.6 years; mean expanded CAG in the MJD1 gene = 73). A TA approach based on the gray-level cooccurrence matrix was applied to T1-MRI. Regions of interest were manually segmented for each subject, and texture parameters were computed for each of the aforementioned anatomical structures.
TA parameters showed differences between the 2 groups for the caudate nuclei, thalami, and putamen. No differences were found for the CC.
TA was capable of detecting tissue alterations in MRI of patients with MJD. These alterations were in areas already shown to be affected by histopathological studies. In addition, we confirmed the thalamic involvement in patients with MJD, which had only been demonstrated in volumetric studies.
背景/目的：纹理分析（TA）是图像处理的一个分支，试图从磁共振成像（MRI）等数字图像中传递“纹理”信息。Machado-Joseph 病（MJD）主要影响小脑和脑干，但最近的研究表明，其他大脑结构也可能受到影响。
使用 TA 研究 MJD 患者胼胝体（CC）、丘脑、壳核和尾状核的细微结构异常。
研究了 18 名健康志愿者和 18 名 MJD 患者（发病时的平均年龄=34.7 岁；病程=9.6 年；MJD1 基因中扩展的 CAG 平均=73）。应用基于灰度共生矩阵的 TA 方法对 T1-MRI 进行分析。为每位受试者手动分割感兴趣区域，并计算上述每个解剖结构的纹理参数。
TA 参数在尾状核、丘脑和壳核的两组之间存在差异。CC 无差异。
TA 能够检测 MJD 患者 MRI 中的组织改变。这些改变发生在已经被组织病理学研究证实受影响的区域。此外，我们还证实了 MJD 患者的丘脑受累，这仅在体积研究中得到证实。
