The Journal of Neuroscience, February 6, 2008, 28(6):1427-1433; doi:10.1523/JNEUROSCI.3194-07.2008
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Cellular/Molecular
Quantitative Cortical Mapping of Fractional Anisotropy in Developing Rat Brains
Hao Huang,1,3
Akria Yamamoto,1,4
Mir Ahamed Hossain,2
Laurent Younes,5 and
Susumu Mori1,6
Department of 1Radiology and 2Neurology, School of Medicine, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Maryland 21205, 3Advanced Imaging Research Center, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, Texas 75390, 4Department of Diagnostic Imaging and Nuclear Medicine, Kyoto University, Kyoto, 6048845,Japan 5Center of Imaging Science, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Maryland 21218, and 6F. M. Kirby Research Center for Functional Brain Imaging, Kennedy Krieger Institute, Baltimore, Maryland 21205
Correspondence should be addressed to Dr. Susumu Mori, The Russell H. Morgan Department of Radiology and Radiological Science, The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, 217 Traylor Building, 720 Rutland Avenue, Baltimore, MD 21205. Email: susumu{at}mri.jhu.edu
Cortical development is associated with a series of events that involve axon and dendrite growth and synaptic formation. Although these developmental processes have been investigated in detail with histology, three-dimensional and quantitative imaging methods for rodent brains may be useful for genetic and pharmacological studies in which cortical developmental abnormalities are suspected. It has been shown that diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) can delineate the columnar organization of the fetal and early neonatal cortex based on a high degree of diffusion anisotropy along the columnar structures. This anisotropy is known to decrease during brain development. In this study, we applied DTI to developing rat brains at five developmental stages, postnatal days 0, 3, 7, 11 and 19, and used diffusion anisotropy as an index to characterize the structural change. Statistical analysis reveals four distinctive cortical areas that demonstrate a characteristic time course of anisotropy loss. This method may provide a means to delineate specific cortical areas and a quantitative method to detect abnormalities in cortical development in rodent pathological models.
Key words: rat; brain; development; magnetic resonance imaging; diffusion; dendrite; cortex
Received July 13, 2007;
revised Dec. 11, 2007;
accepted Dec. 13, 2007.
Correspondence should be addressed to Dr. Susumu Mori, The Russell H. Morgan Department of Radiology and Radiological Science, The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, 217 Traylor Building, 720 Rutland Avenue, Baltimore, MD 21205. Email: susumu{at}mri.jhu.edu
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