Abstract #0982

Detection of Glycine as a Biomarker of Malignancy in Childhood Brain Tumours Using In-Vivo 1H MRS at Short and Long TE

Nigel Paul Davies^1,2, Martin Wilson^1,3, Kal Natarajan^1,2, Yu Sun^1,3, Shaheen Lateef³, Lesley MacPherson³, Marie-Anne Brundler³, Theodorus N. Arvanitis^3,4, Richard G. Grundy⁵, Andrew Charles Peet^1,3

¹Cancer Sciences, University of Birmingham, Birmingham, UK; ²Imaging & Medical Physics, University Hospital Birmingham NHS Foundation Trust, Birmingham, UK; ³Birmingham Children's Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, Birmingham, UK; ⁴School of Electronic, Electrical & Computer Engineering, University of Birmingham, Birmingham, UK; ⁵Children's Brain Tumour Research Centre, University of Nottingham, Nottingham, UK

MRS provides a unique opportunity to study the metabolism of brain tumours non-invasively. Glycine is thought to be relevant in the metabolism of malignant brain tumours, but it is difficult to distinguish at low field from myo-inositol at around 3.6 ppm. LCModel analysis of short and long TE single-voxel MRS employing simulated basis sets has been used to quantify glycine in 48 childhood brain tumours in comparison with HR-MAS studies of biopsy samples. In vivo, glycine was found in medulloblastomas and glioblastomas but not in low grade astrocytomas, consistent with previous studies and in agreement with the HR-MAS results.