Journal of neuroimaging : official journal of the American Society of Neuroimaging
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Tai Chi is a mind-body exercise that has been shown to improve both mental and physical health. As a result, recent literature suggests the use of Tai Chi to treat both physical and psychological disorders. However, the underlying physiological changes have not been characterized. The aim of this pilot study is to assess the changes in brain metabolites and muscle energetics after Tai Chi training in an aging population using a combined brain-muscle magnetic resonance spectroscopy (MRS) examination. ⋯ Our pilot study demonstrates significant increase of NAA/Cr ratios in posterior cingulate gyrus and significantly improved PCr recovery time in leg muscles in older adults following short-term Tai Chi training, and thus provides insight into the beneficial mechanisms.
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Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is crucial for in vivo detection and characterization of white matter lesions (WMLs) in multiple sclerosis. While WMLs have been studied for over two decades using MRI, automated segmentation remains challenging. Although the majority of statistical techniques for the automated segmentation of WMLs are based on single imaging modalities, recent advances have used multimodal techniques for identifying WMLs. Complementary modalities emphasize different tissue properties, which help identify interrelated features of lesions. ⋯ MIMoSA resulted in statistically significant improvements in lesion segmentation performance compared with LesionTOADS and OASIS, and performed competitively in an additional validation study.
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The thalamus is a part of the diencephalon, containing numerous connections between the forebrain and subcortical structures. It serves an important function as a relay center between the cerebral cortex and the subcortical regions, particularly with sensory information. The thalamus also plays a major role in regulating arousal and the levels of awareness. ⋯ In addition, we will also review the variant thalamic territories and associated infarction syndromes of the anteromedian, central, and posterolateral territories. This review article is aimed to better the clinical and radiologic understanding as well as the diagnosis of classic and variant thalamic territory infarcts. This article will also briefly touch on the recovery of function after thalamic infarcts.
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To investigate accumulative aging effects on neurometabolism in human brain and to collect a reference dataset. ⋯ Age-related accumulative metabolic changes in aging human brain correlated with reduced neuronal metabolic activity and density, reflected by decreased NAA, reduced mitochondrial activity by decreased ATP, and reduced membrane synthesis by decreased PME. These changes are associated with age-related decrease of neuronal volume. Global NAA and ATP might be used as surrogate biomarker for monitoring aging in human brain.
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Surgery is the first choice therapeutic approach in case of drug-resistant epilepsy. Unfortunately, up to 43% of patients referred for presurgical assessment do not have a lesion detectable by routine 3T magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) (MRI-negative), although most of them likely have an underlying epileptogenic lesion. Thus, new MRI modalities with increased sensibility for epileptogenic lesions are required. This paper describes the magnetization-prepared two rapid acquisition gradient echoes (MP2RAGE) and susceptibility-weighted imaging (SWI) findings at 7T in a series of patients with drug-resistant epilepsy of different etiologies. ⋯ MRI at ultra-high field is very promising for the detection of inconspicuous epileptogenic lesions and may facilitate epilepsy surgery of a great number of to-date MRI-negative patients.