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Localization of function‐specific segments of the primary motor pathway in children with Sturge‐Weber syndrome: A multimodal imaging analysis
Author(s) -
Jeong JeongWon,
Chugani Harry T.,
Juhász Csaba
Publication year - 2013
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.24076
Subject(s) - precentral gyrus , diffusion mri , magnetic resonance imaging , supplementary motor area , medicine , primary motor cortex , internal capsule , motor function , functional magnetic resonance imaging , ankle , positron emission tomography , neuroscience , psychology , anatomy , motor cortex , nuclear medicine , physical medicine and rehabilitation , radiology , white matter , stimulation
Purpose To explore whether diffusion‐weighted imaging (DWI) can localize specific segments of primary motor areas in children with Sturge‐Weber syndrome (SWS), this study investigated the corticospinal tract (CST) between precentral gyrus (PCG) and posterior limb of internal capsule (PIC). Materials and Methods DWI was performed on 32 healthy children and seven children with unilateral SWS affecting the sensorimotor area variably. A hierarchical dendrogram was applied to find PCG‐segments uniquely connected to PIC‐segments. The resulting PCG‐clusters were used to image primary motor pathways in DWI and find metabolic abnormalities of primary motor areas in positron emission tomography (PET) scans. Results In healthy children, five PCG‐clusters were found to have unique CST courses, corresponding to CST segments of mouth/lip, fingers, and leg/ankle primary motor areas determined by functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). In children with SWS, reduced streamlines in these PCG clusters were highly correlated with glucose‐hypometabolism on PET (R 2 = 0.2312, P = 0.0032). Impaired CST segment corresponding to finger movements correlated with severity of hand motor deficit. Conclusion The presented method can detect impaired CST segments corresponding to specific motor functions in young children who cannot cooperate for fMRI. This approach can be clinically useful for a noninvasive presurgical evaluation of cortical motor areas in such children. J. Magn. Reson. Imaging 2013;38:1152–1161. © 2013 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.