Abstract #4539

The Anomalous Diffusion γ-parameter depends on local magnetic susceptibility differences when quantified in human brain tissue by MRI

Alessandra Caporale^1,2, Marco Palombo^3,4, Emiliano Macaluso ⁵, Michele Guerreri^4,6, Marco Bozzali⁷, and Silvia Capuani⁸

¹SAIMLAL Dept., Morpho-functional Sciences, Sapienza University of Rome, Rome, Italy, ²CNR ISC UOS Roma Sapienza, Rome, Italy, ³MIRCen, Commissariat à l'Energie Atomique, France, Italy, ⁴Physics Department, CNR ISC UOS Roma Sapienza, Rome, Italy, ⁵ImpAct Team, Lyon Neuroscience Research Center, Lyon, France, France, ⁶SAIMLAL Dept., Morphogenesis & Tissue Engineering, Sapienza University of Rome, Rome, Italy, ⁷NeuroImaging Laboratory, Santa Lucia Foundation, Rome, Italy, ⁸Physics Dept., CNR ISC UOS Roma Sapienza, Rome, Italy

Motivated by previous results obtained in vitro, we investigated the dependence of the anomalous diffusion γ-parameter on local magnetic susceptibility differences (Δχ) in human brain. We performed diffusion weighted experiments varying diffusion gradient strengths in eight healthy subjects at 3.0T and measured the rate of relaxation (R2*). We found significant strong linear correlations between γ and R2* both in white and gray matter selected regions. Conversely, DTI-parameters did not correlate with R2*. Consequently AD-γ depends on Δχ due to differences in myelin orientation and iron content. This makes AD-imaging even more appealing for clinical neuroimaging investigations.

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