Orthogonal Diffusion Anisotropy Measurements in the Dorsal Third Ventricle of Adult Rat Brain Reveal Cerebrospinal Fluid Flow

Laura Nieto-Charques¹, Pilar Lpez-Larrubia¹, Sebastin Cerdn¹

Diffusion Weighted Magnetic Resonance Imaging (DW-MRI) provides information on the microstructure of tissues and its changes. However, the calculated ADC values may contain contributions from additional translational motions or flow. To investigate this aspect we measured water ADC in three orthogonal directions of the Dorsal Third Ventricle of rat brain during a live-sacrifice and low-high b value paradigms. We found that CSF flow through the head-feet direction of the D3V increased significantly the ADC determined in this direction for both low and high b value sequences. An isotropic diffusion pattern is found when impeding CSF flow by sacrificing the animals.