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Updated: Oct 23, 2025
Longitudinal In Vivo Imaging of the Cerebrovasculature: Relevance to CNS Diseases
Published on: December 6, 2016
Age-dependent Intracranial Artery Morphology in Healthy Children
Jennifer L Quon1, Pauline Mouches2, Lily H Kim1,3
1Department of Neurosurgery, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA, USA.
Insights
Intracranial artery morphology in children remains constant during development. This study provides a quantitative framework for evaluating pediatric neurovascular diseases using magnetic resonance angiography (MRA).
Area of Science:
- Neuroimaging
- Pediatric Neurology
- Vascular Biology
Background:
- Intracranial artery morphology assessment is crucial for diagnosing neurovascular diseases.
- Current diagnostic methods rely on qualitative analysis of vascular imaging, like magnetic resonance angiography (MRA).
- Limited data exists on normal pediatric intracranial arterial morphology across developmental stages.
Purpose of the Study:
- To quantitatively assess age-related changes in normal intracranial artery morphology in children.
- To establish a baseline for normal pediatric cerebral vessel dimensions.
Main Methods:
- Retrospective analysis of MRA data from 98 children (aged 0.6-20 years) with normal intracranial vasculature.
- Automated artery segmentation to determine vessel radius.
- Atlas-based approach to measure average artery radius and density in cerebral territories and specific major arteries.
Main Results:
- Intracranial artery radii, average artery radius, and density remained constant across childhood and adolescence.
- No significant age-related changes were observed in the measured parameters (|r| < 0.369).
Conclusions:
- This study offers the first automated evaluation of intracranial vessel morphology in children using MRA.
- The findings provide a foundational framework for quantitative assessment of pediatric neurovascular conditions.
Purpose:
Evaluation of intracranial artery morphology plays an important role in diagnosing a variety of neurovascular diseases. In addition to clinical symptoms, diagnosis currently relies on qualitative rather than quantitative evaluation of vascular imaging sequences, such as magnetic resonance angiography (MRA). However, there is a paucity of literature on normal arterial morphology in the pediatric population across brain development. We aimed to quantitatively assess normal, age-related changes in artery morphology in children.
Methods:
We performed retrospective analysis of pediatric MRA data obtained from a tertiary referral center. An MRA dataset from 98 children (49 boys/49 girls) aged 0.6-20 years (median = 11.5 years) with normal intracranial vasculature was retrospectively collected between 2011 and 2018. All arteries were automatically segmented to determine the vessel radius. Using an atlas-based approach, the average radius and density of arteries were measured in the three main cerebral vascular territories and the radius of five major arteries was determined at corresponding locations.
Results:
The radii of the major arteries as well as the average artery radius and density in the different vascular territories in the brain remained constant throughout childhood and adolescence (|r| < 0.369 in all cases).
Conclusion:
This study presents the first automated evaluation of intracranial vessel morphology on MRA across childhood. Our results can serve as a framework for quantitative evaluation of cerebral vessel morphology in the setting of pediatric neurovascular diseases.
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