Contrast-Enhanced µCT for Visualizing and Evaluating Murine Intestinal Inflammation.

Area of Science:

• Medical Imaging
• Gastroenterology
• Inflammatory Bowel Disease Research

Background:

• Assessing experimental intestinal inflammation requires simple, rapid protocols.
• Existing methods for evaluating colitis progression can be time-consuming or invasive.
• Micro-computed tomography (µCT) offers high-resolution imaging for small animal studies.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop and validate a simple, fast protocol for assessing acute and chronic experimental intestinal inflammation using contrast-enhanced µCT.
• To evaluate the utility of contrast-enhanced µCT for longitudinal monitoring of intestinal wall thickness and perfusion in murine colitis models.

Main Methods:

• Established acute (dextran sodium sulfate) and chronic (adoptive transfer) colitis models in female mice.
• Performed longitudinal contrast-enhanced µCT scans to measure intestinal wall thickness and perfusion dynamics.
• Compared µCT findings with weight development, endoscopy, and ex vivo histological analysis.

Main Results:

• Contrast-enhanced µCT detected significant increases in intestinal wall thickness in acute and chronic colitis models.
• Perfusion analysis revealed characteristic late contrast enhancement in inflamed colons.
• µCT measurements showed strong correlations with endoscopic (r=0.75) and histological (r=0.83) assessments of inflammation.

Conclusions:

• Contrast-enhanced µCT is a simple, rapid, and non-invasive method for assessing acute intestinal inflammation.
• This technique effectively monitors disease progression in experimental chronic colitis models.
• A single contrast-enhanced µCT scan can quantify the degree of inflammation throughout the digestive tract in murine models.