• Edward W Johnston, Elisenda Bonet-Carne, Uran Ferizi, Ben Yvernault, Hayley Pye, Dominic Patel, Joey Clemente, Wivijin Piga, Susan Heavey, Harbir S Sidhu, Francesco Giganti, James O'Callaghan, Mrishta Brizmohun Appayya, Alistair Grey, Alexandra Saborowska, Sebastien Ourselin, David Hawkes, Caroline M Moore, Mark Emberton, Hashim U Ahmed, Hayley Whitaker, Manuel Rodriguez-Justo, Alexander Freeman, David Atkinson, Daniel Alexander, Eleftheria Panagiotaki, and Shonit Punwani.
• From the UCL Centre for Medical Imaging, University College London, 2nd Floor Charles Bell House, 43-45 Foley Street, London W1W 7TS, England (E.W.J., E.B.C., H.S.S., J.O., M.B.A., D. Atkinson, S.P.); UCL Centre for Medical Image Computing, London, England (E.B.C., U.F., B.Y., S.O., D.H., D. Alexander, E.P.); UCL Centre for Molecular Intervention, London, England (H.P., S.H., H.W.); Department of Histopathology, University College Hospital, London, England (D.P., M.R.J., A.F.); Department of Radiology (J.C.) and Centre for Medical Imaging (J.C., W.P., A.S.), University College Hospital, London, England; Division of Surgery and Interventional Science, Faculty of Medical Sciences, University College London, London, England (F.G., A.G., C.M.M., M.E.); and Department of Surgery and Cancer, Imperial College London, London, England (H.U.A.).
• Radiology. 2019 May 1; 291 (2): 391-397.

AbstractBackground Biologic specificity of diffusion MRI in relation to prostate cancer aggressiveness may improve by examining separate components of the diffusion MRI signal. The Vascular, Extracellular, and Restricted Diffusion for Cytometry in Tumors (VERDICT) model estimates three distinct signal components and associates them to (a) intracellular water, (b) water in the extracellular extravascular space, and (c) water in the microvasculature. Purpose To evaluate the repeatability, image quality, and diagnostic utility of intracellular volume fraction (FIC) maps obtained with VERDICT prostate MRI and to compare those maps with apparent diffusion coefficient (ADC) maps for Gleason grade differentiation. Materials and Methods Seventy men (median age, 62.2 years; range, 49.5-82.0 years) suspected of having prostate cancer or undergoing active surveillance were recruited to a prospective study between April 2016 and October 2017. All men underwent multiparametric prostate and VERDICT MRI. Forty-two of the 70 men (median age, 67.7 years; range, 50.0-82.0 years) underwent two VERDICT MRI acquisitions to assess repeatability of FIC measurements obtained with VERDICT MRI. Repeatability was measured with use of intraclass correlation coefficients (ICCs). The image quality of FIC and ADC maps was independently evaluated by two board-certified radiologists. Forty-two men (median age, 64.8 years; range, 49.5-79.6 years) underwent targeted biopsy, which enabled comparison of FIC and ADC metrics in the differentiation between Gleason grades. Results VERDICT MRI FIC demonstrated ICCs of 0.87-0.95. There was no significant difference between image quality of ADC and FIC maps (score, 3.1 vs 3.3, respectively; P = .90). FIC was higher in lesions with a Gleason grade of at least 3+4 compared with benign and/or Gleason grade 3+3 lesions (mean, 0.49 ± 0.17 vs 0.31 ± 0.12, respectively; P = .002). The difference in ADC between these groups did not reach statistical significance (mean, 1.42 vs 1.16 × 10-3 mm2/sec; P = .26). Conclusion Fractional intracellular volume demonstrates high repeatability and image quality and enables better differentiation of a Gleason 4 component cancer from benign and/or Gleason 3+3 histology than apparent diffusion coefficient. Published under a CC BY 4.0 license. Online supplemental material is available for this article. See also the editorial by Sigmund and Rosenkrantz in this issue.

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