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MRI study of transient cerebral ischemia in the gerbil: interest of T2 mapping
T Messager1, F Franconi, L Lemaire
1Unité de Vectorisation Particulaire, Faculté de Médecine, Université d'Angers, France. tristan.messager@univ-angers.fr
Rationale And Objectives:
The aim of this study was to evaluate the diagnostic use of MRI and, more precisely, the use of quantitative T2 imaging at 7 T for the early detection of neuronal cerebral alterations after transient ischemia in the gerbil.
Methods:
One hundred forty-seven Mongolian gerbils were separated into four groups for which a bicarotid artery occlusion lasted for 4, 6, 8, or 10 minutes, respectively. The animals were scanned before carotid artery occlusion and at 3, 6, 10, 24, and 48 hours and 5 days after the ischemic incident. MR images were acquired on a Bruker Avance DRX300 mini-imaging system.
Results:
Our results show that T2 mapping is able to localize brain damage induced by transient ischemia and to detect early perturbations in water content (as early as 6 hours after ischemia).
Conclusions:
T2 measurements in the striata are correlated with the severity of the ischemic incident, since the changes observed on the T2 images are directly proportional to the duration of occlusion.