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White matter hyperintensities and microplastics
Elaine L Bearer1,2, Marcus A Garcia3, Natalie Adolphi4
1Department of Pathology, School of Medicine, University of New Mexico Health Science Center, Albuquerque, NM.
Synopsis:
White matter hyperintensities are abnormalities that appear in MRI scans of living patients but are not apparent in MRI post-mortem.
Goal:
Our goal is to understand the cellular/biological basis of white matter hyperintensities (WMH).
Approach:
We aligned post-mortem MR scans with those collected ante-mortem and performed histopathology and pyrGC/MS for plastics on regions with WMH.
Result:
PyrGC/MS detected large amounts of plastics and we determined their cellular locations with a novel optical imaging approach in regions with small vessel disease and Abeta plaques.
Impact:
Microplastics in the brains of people with cognitive impairment may be due to pre-existing vascular injury or contribute to it. Many questions remain: Where do they come from, do they impair function? Can they be diagnosed by MRI ante-mortem?
