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Increased self‐diffusion of brain water in normal aging
Author(s) -
Gideon Peter,
Thomsen Carsten,
Henriksen Ole
Publication year - 1994
Publication title -
journal of magnetic resonance imaging
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.563
H-Index - 160
eISSN - 1522-2586
pISSN - 1053-1807
DOI - 10.1002/jmri.1880040216
Subject(s) - white matter , magnetic resonance imaging , diffusion imaging , effective diffusion coefficient , diffusion mri , medicine , nuclear medicine , nuclear magnetic resonance , gray (unit) , diffusion weighted magnetic resonance imaging , pathology , radiology , physics
With magnetic resonance (MR) imaging, brain water self‐diffusion was measured in 17 healthy volunteers 22–76 (mean, 44.6) years old. The calculated values for the apparent diffusion coefficients (ADCs) ranged from 0.58 × 10 −9 to 1.23 × 10 −9 m 2 /sec in cerebral white matter. A significant correlation was found between the ADC in white matter and age ( r =.7069, P <.01). The calculated values for ADC in cortical gray matter ranged from 1.06 × 10 −9 to 1.72 × 10 −9 m 2 /sec no correlation was found between ADCs in gray matter and age. The increased ADC in white matter may be caused by an increase in the extracellular volume due to age‐dependent neuronal degeneration or to changes in myelination. These findings have implications for future clinical investigations with diffusion MR imaging techniques in patients with neurologic diseases, and stress the importance of having an agematched group of healthy volunteers for comparison.