Department of Radiology, Mayo Clinic College of Medicine, Rochester, MN 55905, USA.
Magn Reson Imaging. 2012 May;30(4):535-9. doi: 10.1016/j.mri.2011.12.019. Epub 2012 Feb 10.
The increasing prevalence of Alzheimer's disease (AD) has provided motivation for developing novel methods for assessing the disease and the effects of potential treatments. Magnetic resonance elastography (MRE) is an MRI-based method for quantitatively imaging the shear tissue stiffness in vivo. The objective of this research was to determine whether this new imaging biomarker has potential for characterizing neurodegenerative disease. Methods were developed and tested for applying MRE to evaluate the mouse brain, using a conventional large bore 3.0T MRI system. The technique was then applied to study APP-PS1 mice, a well-characterized model of AD. Five APP-PS1 mice and 8 age-matched wild-type mice were imaged immediately following sacrifice. Brain shear stiffness measurements in APP-PS1 mice averaged 22.5% lower than those for wild-type mice (P = .0031). The results indicate that mouse brain MRE is feasible at 3.0T, and brain shear stiffness has merit for further investigation as a potential new biomarker for Alzheimer's disease.
阿尔茨海默病(AD)的发病率不断上升,这为开发评估疾病和潜在治疗效果的新方法提供了动力。磁共振弹性成像(MRE)是一种基于 MRI 的方法,可定量成像体内的剪切组织刚度。本研究的目的是确定这种新的成像生物标志物是否具有表征神经退行性疾病的潜力。开发并测试了应用 MRE 评估使用传统大孔径 3.0T MRI 系统的小鼠大脑的方法。然后将该技术应用于 APP-PS1 小鼠(AD 的一种特征明确的模型)的研究。在处死之后立即对 5 只 APP-PS1 小鼠和 8 只年龄匹配的野生型小鼠进行成像。APP-PS1 小鼠的大脑剪切刚度测量值平均比野生型小鼠低 22.5%(P =.0031)。结果表明,3.0T 时小鼠脑 MRE 是可行的,并且脑剪切刚度具有进一步研究作为潜在的阿尔茨海默病新生物标志物的价值。