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Texture of brain magnetic resonance images is associated with tau accumulation but not with amyloid accumulation in Alzheimer’s disease
Author(s) -
Lee Subin,
Kim Ki Woong
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
alzheimer's and dementia
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 6.713
H-Index - 118
eISSN - 1552-5279
pISSN - 1552-5260
DOI - 10.1002/alz.040172
Subject(s) - precuneus , magnetic resonance imaging , posterior cingulate , positron emission tomography , entorhinal cortex , cytoarchitecture , temporal cortex , amyloid (mycology) , neuroimaging , alzheimer's disease , cortex (anatomy) , pathology , hippocampus , medicine , psychology , neuroscience , nuclear medicine , functional magnetic resonance imaging , disease , radiology
Background Spatial variations in signal intensity on magnetic resonance images (MRI), as measured by texture analysis, has been reported to be able to discriminate and predict progression to Alzheimer’s disease (AD). In this study, we investigated associations between the MRI signal intensity variations and hallmark AD pathologies (amyloid and tau accumulation). Method Study participants consisted of 151 subjects from the Alzheimer’s Disease Neuroimaging Initiative 3 who had a T1‐weighted image, AV45 positron emission tomography (PET), and AV1451 PET. We extracted texture features from each of five regions: entorhinal cortex, hippocampus, posterior cingulate cortex, precuneus, and superior frontal cortex. Cerebral amyloid burden was measured as standardized uptake value ratio (SUVR) in AV45 positron emission tomography (PET), and cerebral tau burden was measured as SUVR in AV1451 PET. We investigated associations between each texture feature and AD pathological measures in each of the regions by using linear regression, controlling for the effects of age and gender. We also compared texture features and AD pathological burden among in vivo Braak stage groups. Result Regional texture were associated with regional tau burden but not with amyloid burden. Furthermore, the texture features that were associated with tau accumulation were different between regions with different cytoarchitecture. Significant group differences were observed for amyloid and tau accumulation, and certain texture features. Mean signal intensity showed an increasing trend across higher stage groups. Conclusion This study suggests that brain MRI texture may reflect microstructural changes related to tau accumulation, and has potential as an early non‐invasive imaging marker of AD. This study was supported by a grant from the Korean Health Technology R&D Project, Ministry of Health and Welfare, Republic of Korea (grant no. HI09C1379 [A092077]).