Comparison of cerebral white matter fractional anisotropy and metabolite concentrations measured by 1 H-MRS in healthy adults / 实用放射学杂志

ABSTRACT

Objective To investigate the relationship between cerebral white matter fractional anisotropy(FA)and metabolite con-centrations measured by 1 H magnetic resonance spectroscopy(1 H-MRS)in healthy adults.Methods Diffusion tensor imaging(DTI) and 1 H-MRS were acquired from thirty-one healthy adults at 3.0 T MR system.The concentrations of N-acetylaspartate(NAA), choline(Cho),creatine(Cr),the ratios of NAA/Cr and FA values of DTI were measured in 353 voxels,covering the bilateral medium corona radiata.According to the age,all voxels were divided into two groupsthe senior group (mean age=29 years),and the senior group(mean age=5 6 years).The correlations between FA values and age were analyzed using Pearson’s correlation coefficients.The correlations between FA values and metabolite concentrations were estimated using partial correlations test controlling for the age re-lated bias.Results Pearson’s correlation analysis revealed a negative correlation between FA values and age in 353 voxels(r=-0.146,P<0.05),senior group(r=-0.204,P<0.05)and senior group(r=-0.162,P<0.05).Only the correlation between NAA and FA values were significant(r=0.339,P<0.05;r=0.213,P<0.05;r=0.430,P<0.05).There were positive relation-ships between FA values and NAA/Cr among 353 voxels (r=0.166,P<0.05)and senior group(r=0.305,P<0.05).Conclusion There are correlations between cerebral white matter FA values and metabolite concentrations measured by 1 H-MRS .Combining 1 H-MRS with DTI can reveal the relationship between microscopic white matter integrity and metabolic characteristics of the white matter.