Lipofibromatous hamartoma of the median nerve: 3T MRI evaluation by constrained spherical deconvolution analysis

In this study we described a case of lipofibromatous hamartoma involving the median nerve. We adopted diffusion tensor imaging and constrained spherical deconvolution-based tractography to reconstruct the affected median nerve. Moreover, we extracted diffusion-based parameters reflecting axonal integrity loss of median nerve fibres. Our data showed that constrained spherical deconvolution-based tractography outperformed the diffusion tensor imaging-based method, allowing the detection of the entire median nerve, including its branches, thus offering a robust method to investigate the involvement of the median nerve in pathological conditions. All clinical and technical implications are extensively described.

Download Full-text

Going Beyond Diffusion Tensor Imaging Tractography in Eloquent Glioma Surgery–High-Resolution Fiber Tractography: Q-Ball or Constrained Spherical Deconvolution?

World Neurosurgery ◽

10.1016/j.wneu.2019.10.138 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 134 ◽

pp. e596-e609 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Daniela Becker ◽

Moritz Scherer ◽

Peter Neher ◽

Christine Jungk ◽

Jessica Jesser ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Diffusion Tensor Imaging ◽

High Resolution ◽

Diffusion Tensor ◽

Fiber Tractography ◽

Glioma Surgery ◽

Constrained Spherical Deconvolution ◽

Spherical Deconvolution ◽

Diffusion Tensor Imaging Tractography

Download Full-text

Optic radiations evaluation in patients affected by high-grade gliomas: a side-by-side constrained spherical deconvolution and diffusion tensor imaging study

Neuroradiology ◽

10.1007/s00234-016-1732-8 ◽

2016 ◽

Vol 58 (11) ◽

pp. 1067-1075 ◽

Cited By ~ 11

Author(s):

Enricomaria Mormina ◽

Alessandro Arrigo ◽

Alessandro Calamuneri ◽

Concetta Alafaci ◽

Francesco Tomasello ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Diffusion Tensor Imaging ◽

Diffusion Tensor ◽

Imaging Study ◽

High Grade ◽

Constrained Spherical Deconvolution ◽

Spherical Deconvolution ◽

High Grade Gliomas ◽

And Diffusion ◽

Optic Radiations ◽

Diffusion Tensor Imaging Study

Download Full-text

White matter fiber tractography: why we need to move beyond DTI

Journal of Neurosurgery ◽

10.3171/2013.2.jns121294 ◽

2013 ◽

Vol 118 (6) ◽

pp. 1367-1377 ◽

Cited By ~ 228

Author(s):

Shawna Farquharson ◽

J.-Donald Tournier ◽

Fernando Calamante ◽

Gavin Fabinyi ◽

Michal Schneider-Kolsky ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Diffusion Tensor Imaging ◽

White Matter ◽

Diffusion Tensor ◽

Neurosurgical Procedures ◽

Fiber Tractography ◽

Constrained Spherical Deconvolution ◽

Spherical Deconvolution ◽

Corticospinal Tracts ◽

Diffusion Weighted ◽

Weighted Data

Object Diffusion-based MRI tractography is an imaging tool increasingly used in neurosurgical procedures to generate 3D maps of white matter pathways as an aid to identifying safe margins of resection. The majority of white matter fiber tractography software packages currently available to clinicians rely on a fundamentally flawed framework to generate fiber orientations from diffusion-weighted data, namely diffusion tensor imaging (DTI). This work provides the first extensive and systematic exploration of the practical limitations of DTI-based tractography and investigates whether the higher-order tractography model constrained spherical deconvolution provides a reasonable solution to these problems within a clinically feasible timeframe. Methods Comparison of tractography methodologies in visualizing the corticospinal tracts was made using the diffusion-weighted data sets from 45 healthy controls and 10 patients undergoing presurgical imaging assessment. Tensor-based and constrained spherical deconvolution–based tractography methodologies were applied to both patients and controls. Results Diffusion tensor imaging–based tractography methods (using both deterministic and probabilistic tractography algorithms) substantially underestimated the extent of tracks connecting to the sensorimotor cortex in all participants in the control group. In contrast, the constrained spherical deconvolution tractography method consistently produced the biologically expected fan-shaped configuration of tracks. In the clinical cases, in which tractography was performed to visualize the corticospinal pathways in patients with concomitant risk of neurological deficit following neurosurgical resection, the constrained spherical deconvolution–based and tensor-based tractography methodologies indicated very different apparent safe margins of resection; the constrained spherical deconvolution–based method identified corticospinal tracts extending to the entire sensorimotor cortex, while the tensor-based method only identified a narrow subset of tracts extending medially to the vertex. Conclusions This comprehensive study shows that the most widely used clinical tractography method (diffusion tensor imaging–based tractography) results in systematically unreliable and clinically misleading information. The higher-order tractography model, using the same diffusion-weighted data, clearly demonstrates fiber tracts more accurately, providing improved estimates of safety margins that may be useful in neurosurgical procedures. We therefore need to move beyond the diffusion tensor framework if we are to begin to provide neurosurgeons with biologically reliable tractography information.

Download Full-text

Diffusion tensor imaging and fiber tractography of the median nerve at 1.5T: optimization of b value

Skeletal Radiology ◽

10.1007/s00256-008-0577-6 ◽

2008 ◽

Vol 38 (1) ◽

pp. 51-59 ◽

Cited By ~ 38

Author(s):

Gustav Andreisek ◽

Lawrence M. White ◽

Andrea Kassner ◽

George Tomlinson ◽

Marshall S. Sussman

Keyword(s):

Diffusion Tensor Imaging ◽

Median Nerve ◽

Diffusion Tensor ◽

B Value ◽

Fiber Tractography

Download Full-text

MR neurography of the median nerve at 3.0T: Optimization of diffusion tensor imaging and fiber tractography

European Journal of Radiology ◽

10.1016/j.ejrad.2012.03.017 ◽

2012 ◽

Vol 81 (7) ◽

pp. e775-e782 ◽

Cited By ~ 25

Author(s):

Roman Guggenberger ◽

Patrick Eppenberger ◽

Daniel Markovic ◽

Daniel Nanz ◽

Avneesh Chhabra ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Diffusion Tensor Imaging ◽

Median Nerve ◽

Diffusion Tensor ◽

Fiber Tractography ◽

Mr Neurography

Download Full-text

Evaluating the performance of 3-tissue constrained spherical deconvolution pipelines for within-tumor tractography

10.1101/629873 ◽

2019 ◽

Cited By ~ 5

Author(s):

Hannelore Aerts ◽

Thijs Dhollander ◽

Daniele Marinazzo

Keyword(s):

White Matter ◽

Tumor Tissue ◽

Diffusion Tensor ◽

Orientation Distribution ◽

Constrained Spherical Deconvolution ◽

Spherical Deconvolution ◽

Fiber Orientation Distribution ◽

Tissue Compartments ◽

Diffusion Tensor Imaging Dti ◽

Single Shell

AbstractThe use of diffusion MRI (dMRI) for assisting in the planning of neurosurgery has become increasingly common practice, allowing to non-invasively map white matter pathways via tractography techniques. Limitations of earlier pipelines based on the diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) model have since been revealed and improvements were made possible by constrained spherical deconvolution (CSD) pipelines. CSD allows to resolve a full white matter (WM) fiber orientation distribution (FOD), which can describe so-called “crossing fibers”: complex local geometries of WM tracts, which DTI fails to model. This was found to have a profound impact on tractography results, with substantial implications for presurgical decision making and planning. More recently, CSD itself has been extended to allow for modeling of other tissue compartments in addition to the WM FOD, typically resulting in a 3-tissue CSD model. It seems likely this may improve the capability to resolve WM FODs in the presence of infiltrating tumor tissue. In this work, we evaluated the performance of 3-tissue CSD pipelines, with a focus on within-tumor tractography. We found that a technique named single-shell 3-tissue CSD (SS3T-CSD) successfully allowed tractography within infiltrating gliomas, without increasing existing single-shell dMRI acquisition requirements.

Download Full-text