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MR tractography with diffusion tensor imaging in clinical routine

  • Diagnostic Neuroradiology
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Abstract

Using MRI, we demonstrated that the depiction of the cerebral white matter fiber tracts has become a routine procedure. Diffusion tensor (DT) sequences may be analyzed with combined volume analysis and tractography extraction software, giving indirect visualization of white matter connections. We obtained DT data from 20 subjects with normal MR imaging and five patients presenting cerebral diseases such as brain tumors, multiple sclerosis and stroke, with five patients explored on two different MR scanners. Data were transferred to dedicated workstations for anatomical realignment, determination of voxel eigenvectors and calculation of fiber tract orientations in a region of interest. In all subjects, axonal directions underlying the main neuronal pathways could be delineated. Comparisons between diseased regions and contralateral areas demonstrated changes in voxel anisotropy in injured regions, revealing possible preferential fiber orientations within diffuse T2 hyperintensities. Rapid data processing allows imaging of the normal and diseased fiber pathways as part of the routine MRI examination. Therefore, it appears that whenever white matter disease is suspected a tractography can be performed with this fast and simple method that we proved to be reliable and reproducible

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Acknowledgements

We would like to thank Dr. Y. Masutani and his team (University of Tokyo, Japan) for technical support (Volume-One® and dTV® software) and Ms. L. Harrison (Boston University, USA) for editing this article.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Neuro-Imaging, Centre Hospitalier National d’Ophtalmologie des XV-XX, UPMC Paris 6, CNRS UMR 6569, UPR 2147, Paris, France

    T. H. Nguyen, J. L. Stievenart, M. T. Iba-Zizen, L. Bellinger, A. Abanou & E. A. Cabanis

  2. Service de Neuro-Imagerie, C.H.N.O. des XV-XX, 28 rue de Charenton, 75012, Paris, France

    T. H. Nguyen

  3. Department of Ophthalmology, Jikei University School of Medicine, Tokyo, Japan

    M. Yoshida & K. Kitahara

  4. Department of Biophysics and Nuclear Medicine, Assistance Publique Hopitaux de Paris, BEAUJON Hospital, Clichy, France

    J. L. Stievenart

Authors
  1. T. H. Nguyen
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  2. M. Yoshida
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  3. J. L. Stievenart
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  4. M. T. Iba-Zizen
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  5. L. Bellinger
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  6. A. Abanou
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  7. K. Kitahara
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  8. E. A. Cabanis
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Correspondence to T. H. Nguyen.

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Nguyen, T.H., Yoshida, M., Stievenart, J.L. et al. MR tractography with diffusion tensor imaging in clinical routine. Neuroradiology 47, 334–343 (2005). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00234-005-1338-z

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00234-005-1338-z

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