Histogram analysis of quantitative susceptibility mapping and apparent diffusion coefficient for identifying isocitrate dehydrogenase genotypes and tumor subtypes of adult-type diffuse gliomas.

Background: Accurate preoperative identification of isocitrate dehydrogenase (IDH) genotypes and tumor subtypes is highly important for proper treatment planning and prognosis evaluation in patients with glioma. This study aimed to differentiate IDH genotypes and tumor subtypes of adult-type diffuse gliomas using histogram features of quantitative susceptibility mapping (QSM) and apparent diffusion coefficient (ADC). Methods: This prospective study enrolled patients with suspected gliomas between March 2019 and January 2022 in a random series. Histogram features of QSM and ADC were extracted from the tumor parenchyma. The Mann-Whitney U test was used to compare the difference in histogram features between different IDH genotypes and among tumor subtypes. Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curves were constructed to assess the corresponding diagnostic performance. Results: This study included 47 patients with histopathologically confirmed adult-type diffuse gliomas. Totals of seven QSM features including 10th percentile (P10), 90th percentile (P90), interquartile range (IQR), maximum, mean absolute deviation (MAD), root mean squared (RMS), and variance, and five ADC features including P10, mean, median, RMS, and skewness exhibited significant differences between different IDH genotypes (P<0.05 for all), with the IQR of QSM demonstrating the highest area under curve (AUC) of 0.774 [95% confidence interval (CI): 0.635-0.913]. For separating tumor subtypes, the IQR of QSM also showed the highest AUC of 0.745 (95% CI: 0.566-0.924) for glioblastoma (GBM) versus astrocytoma and 0.848 (95% CI: 0.706-0.989) for GBM versus oligodendroglioma, but none of the features could discriminate astrocytoma from oligodendroglioma. The combination of the IQR of QSM, P10 of ADC, and age achieved the highest AUC of 0.910 (95% CI: 0.826-0.994) for IDH genotypes, and 0.939 (95% CI: 0.859-1.000) and 0.967 (95% CI: 0.904-1.000) for GBM versus astrocytoma and GBM versus oligodendroglioma, respectively. Conclusions: QSM and ADC histogram features may serve as potential imaging markers for noninvasively assessing IDH genotypes and tumor subtypes of adult-type diffuse gliomas. Combining significant features may enhance the diagnostic performance substantially.

Preserved microstructural integrity of the corticospinal tract in patients with glioma-induced motor epilepsy: a study using mean apparent propagator magnetic resonance imaging.

BACKGROUND: To compare the microstructural integrity of the corticospinal tract (CST) between glioma patients with motor epilepsy and without epilepsy using mean apparent propagator magnetic resonance imaging (MAP-MRI). METHODS: A total of 26 patients with glioma adjacent to the CST pathway (10 with motor epilepsy and 16 without epilepsy) and 13 matched healthy controls underwent brain structural and diffusion MRI. The morphological characteristics of the CST (tract volume, tract number, and average length) were extracted, and diffusion parameter values including mean squared displacement (MSD), q-space inverse variance (QIV), return-to-origin probability (RTOP), return-to-axis probabilities (RTAP), return-to-plane probabilities (RTPP), fractional anisotropy (FA), mean diffusivity (MD), axial diffusivity (AD), and radial diffusivity (RD) along the CST were evaluated. The CST features were compared between healthy and affected sides and the relative CST features were compared across the three groups of participants. A receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve was plotted to assess the performance of each relative CST characteristic for glioma-induced CST changes. RESULTS: For patients without epilepsy, the tract number, tract volume, FA, RD, MSD, QIV, and RTAP changed significantly on the affected CST side compared with those on the healthy CST side (P=0.002, 0.002, 0.030 0.017, 0.039, 0.044, and 0.002, respectively). In contrast, for patients with motor epilepsy, no significant difference was found between the affected and healthy side in almost all CST features except RTPP (P=0.028). Compared with patients with motor epilepsy, the relative tract number, tract volume, AD, and RTAP were significantly lower (P=0.027, 0.018, 0.040, and 0.027, respectively) in patients without epilepsy, and their areas under the curve (AUCs) were 0.763, 0.781, 0.744, and 0.763, respectively. No significant difference was found between patients with motor epilepsy and matched healthy controls. CONCLUSIONS: The MAP-MRI is a promising approach for evaluating CST changes. It provides additional information reflecting the microstructural complexity of the CST and demonstrates the preserved microstructural integrity of the CST in glioma patients with motor epilepsy.

Mean apparent propagator-MRI in evaluation of glioma grade, cellular proliferation, and IDH-1 gene mutation status.

OBJECTIVES: To evaluate the glioma grade, Ki-67 expression, and IDH-1 mutation status using mean apparent propagator (MAP) MRI. METHODS: Forty enrolled glioma patients underwent structural and diffusion MRI. The diffusion metric values including fractional anisotropy (FA), mean diffusivity (MD), mean squared displacement (MSD), q-space inverse variance (QIV), return-to-origin probability (RTOP), return-to-axis probability (RTAP), and return-to-plane probability (RTPP) in tumor parenchyma (TP) and contralateral normal-appearing white matter (NAWM) were calculated. The TP/NAWM ratios of diffusion metric values were correlated with tumor grades, Ki-67, and IDH-1 mutation statuses, and the diagnostic performance was assessed. RESULTS: QIV were significantly higher, whereas RTAP and RTOP were significantly lower in low-grade gliomas (LGGs) than those in high-grade gliomas (HGGs); QIV and MD were significantly higher, whereas RTAP and RTOP were significantly lower in lower-grade gliomas (grade II and III) than those in grade IV gliomas (p < 0.05 for all). RTAP performed best in grading gliomas. MSD, QIV, and MD were significantly higher, whereas RTAP, RTOP, RTPP, and FA were significantly lower in the IDH-1 mutant gliomas than those in the IDH-1 wild-type ones both for all gliomas and lower-grade gliomas (p < 0.05 for all). RTAP performed best in all gliomas, while QIV performed best in lower-grade gliomas. Additionally, RTAP, RTOP, and FA correlated positively, whereas MSD, QIV, and MD correlated negatively with Ki-67 (p < 0.05 for all). CONCLUSIONS: MAP-MRI is a potent approach in evaluating the microstructural changes in gliomas with different grades, cellular proliferation, and IDH-1 mutation statuses. KEY POINTS: • MAP-MRI, a newly developed diffusion technique, accurately reveals microstructure-related features in the complex white matter by recovering important microstructural tissue parameters. • MAP-MRI is a potent approach in evaluating the glioma grade, IDH-1 mutation status, and Ki-67 expression. • Compared with DTI, MAP-MRI seems to demonstrate higher diagnostic performance.

Neurite orientation dispersion and density imaging in evaluation of high-grade glioma-induced corticospinal tract injury.

PURPOSE: To evaluate the application of neurite orientation dispersion and density imaging (NODDI) to brain glioma-induced corticospinal tract (CST) injury. MATERIAL AND METHODS: Twenty-four patients with high-grade glioma (HGG) in or adjacent to the CST pathway and 12 matched healthy subjects underwent structural and diffusion MRI. The CSTs were reconstructed on the both sides. The CST features including morphological features (track number, average track length and track volume) and the diffusion parameter values including fractional anisotraphy (FA), mean diffusivity (MD), intracellular volume fraction (ICVF), isotropic or free water volume fraction (ISOVF) and orientation dispersion index (ODI) along the CST were calculated. The CST features were compared between the affected and healthy side for HGG patients and between the left and right side for healthy subjects. The relative CST features were compared across the healthy subjects, patients with motor weakness and patients with normal muscle strength. Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve was applied to evaluate the performance of each relative CST characteristic for HGG-induced CST changes. RESULTS: Compared with the CST features on the healthy side, the track number, track volume and FA along the CST changed significantly on the affected side for HGG patients (p < 0.05 for all), whereas MD and ICVF changed significantly on the affected side only for HGG patients with motor weakness (p = 0.012 for both). In patients with motor weakness, the relative MD was significantly higher (p < 0.001), whereas the relative FA and ICVF was significantly lower (p = 0.002 and <0.001) than those in patients with normal muscle strength. The relative ICVF had a similar area under curve (AUC) to that of MD (AUC=0.953 and 0.969). Compared with the relative CST features in the healthy subjects, only the relative ICVF was significantly lower in HGG patients with normal muscle strength (p = 0.012). CONCLUSIONS: NODDI seems to be useful in reflecting the HGG infiltration to CST, and can evaluate the CST destruction with a performance similar to DTI by providing additional information about neurite density for HGG-induced CST injury.

Laplacian-Regularized Mean Apparent Propagator-MRI in Evaluating Corticospinal Tract Injury in Patients with Brain Glioma.

OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the application of laplacian-regularized mean apparent propagator (MAPL)-MRI to brain glioma-induced corticospinal tract (CST) injury. MATERIALS AND METHODS: This study included 20 patients with glioma adjacent to the CST pathway who had undergone structural and diffusion MRI. The entire CSTs of the affected and healthy sides were reconstructed, and the peritumoral CSTs were manually segmented. The morphological characteristics of the CST (track number, average length, volume, displacement of the affected CST) were examined and the diffusion parameter values, including fractional anisotropy (FA), mean diffusivity (MD), axial diffusivity (AD), radial diffusivity (RD), mean squared displacement (MSD), q-space inverse variance (QIV), return-to-origin probability (RTOP), return-to-axis probabilities (RTAP), and return-to-plane probabilities (RTPP) along the entire and peritumoral CSTs, were calculated. The entire and peritumoral CST characteristics of the affected and healthy sides as well as those relative CST characteristics of the patients with motor weakness and normal motor function were compared. RESULTS: The track number, volume, MD, RD, MSD, QIV, RTAP, RTOP, and RTPP of the entire and peritumoral CSTs changed significantly for the affected side, whereas the AD and FA changed significantly only in the peritumoral CST (p < 0.05). In patients with motor weakness, the relative MSD of the entire CST, QIV of the entire and peritumoral CSTs, and the AD, MD, RD of the peritumoral CST were significantly higher, whereas the RTPP of the entire and peritumoral CSTs and the RTOP of the peritumoral CST were significantly lower than those in patients with normal motor function (p < 0.05 for all). In contrast, no significant changes were found in the CST morphological characteristics, FA, or RTAP (p > 0.05 for all). CONCLUSION: MAPL-MRI is an effective approach for evaluating microstructural changes after CST injury. Its sensitivity may improve when using the peritumoral CST features.