Scientists image brain structures that deteriorate in Parkinson's
November 26, 2012 by Anne Trafton in Neuroscience
A new imaging technique developed at MIT offers the first glimpse of the degeneration of two brain structures affected by Parkinson's disease.
The technique, which combines several types of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), could allow doctors to better monitor patients' progression and track the effectiveness of potential new treatments, says Suzanne Corkin, MIT professor emerita of neuroscience and leader of the research team. The first author of the paper is David Ziegler, who received his PhD in brain and cognitive sciences from MIT in 2011.
The study, appearing in the Nov. 26 online edition of the Archives of Neurology, is also the first to provide clinical evidence for the theory that Parkinson's neurodegeneration begins deep in the brain and advances upward.
"This progression has never been shown in living people, and that's what was special about this study. With our new imaging methods, we can see these structures more clearly than anyone had seen them before," Corkin says.
Parkinson's disease currently affects 1 to 2 percent of people over 65, totaling five million people worldwide. The disease gradually destroys the brain cells that control movement, leaving most patients wheelchair-bound and completely dependent on caregivers. "A major obstacle to research on the causes and progression of this disease has been a lack of effective brain imaging methods for the areas affected by the disease," Ziegler says.
In 2004, Heiko Braak, an anatomist at Johann Wolfgang Goethe University in Frankfurt, Germany, classified Parkinson's disease into six stages, based on the appearances of the affected brain structures. He proposed that during the earliest stages, a structure deep inside the brain, known as the substantia nigra, begins to degenerate. This structure is critical for movement and also plays important roles in reward and addiction.
Later, Braak proposed, degeneration spreads outward to a brain region known as the basal forebrain. This area, located behind the eyes, includes several structures that produce acetylcholine, a neurotransmitter important for learning and memory.
Neuropathologists (scientists who study the brains of deceased patients) had found evidence for this sequence of events, but it had never been observed in living patients because the substantia nigra, deep within the brain, is so difficult to image with conventional MRI.
To overcome that, the MIT team used four types of MRI scans, each of which uses slightly different magnetic fields, generating different images. By combining these scans, the researchers created composite images of each patient's brain that clearly show the substantia nigra and basal forebrain. "Our new MRI methods provide an unparalleled view of these two structures, allowing us to calculate the precise volumes of each structure," Ziegler says.
After scanning normal brains, the researchers studied 29 early-stage Parkinson's patients. They found significant loss of volume in the substantia nigra early on, followed by loss of basal forebrain volume later in the disease, as predicted by Braak.
In future studies, this MRI technique could be used to follow patients over time and measure whether degeneration of the two areas is correlated or if they deteriorate independently of one another, Corkin says.
This approach could also give doctors a new way to monitor how their patients are responding to treatment, she says. (Most patients are treated with dopamine, which helps to overcome the loss of dopamine-producing neurons in the substantia nigra.) Researchers could also use the new imaging tools to determine the effects of potential new treatments.
Journal reference:
Archives of Neurology
Provided by
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
-
Imaging technique may trace development of Parkinson's disease
Mar 24, 2009 |
not rated yet |
0
-
REM sleep behavior disorder is a risk factor for Parkinson's disease
Jul 29, 2011 |
not rated yet |
0
-
Signaling Ret-receptors protect the live of nerve cells in the aging brain
Mar 13, 2007 |
not rated yet |
0
-
New research implicates natural toxin as triggering Parkinson's disease
Feb 10, 2011 |
not rated yet |
0
-
Researchers identify role of FOXO1 gene in Parkinson's disease
Jun 29, 2012 |
not rated yet |
0
-
Motion perception revisited: High Phi effect challenges established motion perception assumptions
Apr 23, 2013 |
3 / 5 (2) |
2
-
Anything you can do I can do better: Neuromolecular foundations of the superiority illusion (Update)
Apr 02, 2013 |
4.5 / 5 (11) |
5
-
The visual system as economist: Neural resource allocation in visual adaptation
Mar 30, 2013 |
5 / 5 (2) |
9
-
Separate lives: Neuronal and organismal lifespans decoupled
Mar 27, 2013 |
4.9 / 5 (8) |
0
-
Sizing things up: The evolutionary neurobiology of scale invariance
Feb 28, 2013 |
4.8 / 5 (10) |
14
-
Why is zone 1 in liver more prone to ischemic injury?
May 23, 2013
-
How can there be villous adenoma in colon, if there are no villi there
May 22, 2013
-
How can there be a term called "intestinal metaplasia" of stomach
May 21, 2013
-
Pressure-volume curve: Elastic Recoil Pressure don't make sense
May 18, 2013
-
If you became brain-dead, would you want them to pull the plug?
May 17, 2013
-
MRI bill question
May 15, 2013
- More from Physics Forums - Medical Sciences
More news stories
New neuron formation could increase capacity for new learning, at the expense of old memories
New research presented today shows that formation of new neurons in the hippocampus - a brain region known for its importance in learning and remembering - could cause forgetting of old memories by causing a reorganization ...
Neuroscience
9 hours ago |
3.7 / 5 (3) |
0
Help at hand for people with schizophrenia
How can healthy people who hear voices help schizophrenics? Finding the answer for this is at the centre of research conducted at the University of Bergen.
Neuroscience
9 hours ago |
4 / 5 (2) |
2
Japanese research organizations contribute to Human Brain Project
One of the major frontiers of modern science is a comprehensive understanding of the human brain and its functions to guide the development of new technologies in information and communication. In a major announcement for ...
Neuroscience
10 hours ago |
3 / 5 (2) |
0
Controlling mood through the motions of mitochondria
(Medical Xpress)—Regulating the distribution of power in neurons is done by a system that makes the national electric grid look simple by comparison. Each neuron has several thousand mitochondria confined ...
Neuroscience
May 23, 2013 |
4.9 / 5 (9) |
0
|
Brain uses internal 'average voice' prototype to identify who is talking
(Medical Xpress)—The human brain is able to identify individuals' voices by comparing them against an internal 'average voice' prototype, according to neuroscientists.
Neuroscience
May 23, 2013 |
3 / 5 (2) |
3
|
Researchers identify first drug targets in childhood genetic tumor disorder
Two mutations central to the development of infantile myofibromatosis (IM)—a disorder characterized by multiple tumors involving the skin, bone, and soft tissue—may provide new therapeutic targets, according to researchers ...
Engineered cytomegalovirus protects monkeys from HIV equivalent
(Medical Xpress)—A new study by researchers in the US has shown that an ancient virus can be modified to help in the fight against the simian immunodeficiency virus SIV, which is the equivalent in monkeys ...
Driving and hands-free talking lead to spike in errors, study shows
Talking on a hands-free device while behind the wheel can lead to a sharp increase in errors that could imperil other drivers on the road, according to new research from the University of Alberta.
Hormone levels may provide key to understanding psychological disorders in women
Women at a particular stage in their monthly menstrual cycle may be more vulnerable to some of the psychological side-effects associated with stressful experiences, according to a study from UCL.
Going live: Immune cell activation in multiple sclerosis
Biological processes are generally based on events at the molecular and cellular level. To understand what happens in the course of infections, diseases or normal bodily functions, scientists would need to ...
Pollen count apps for smartphones are nothing to sneeze at
Kate O'Reilly's spring allergy survival kit includes the usual stuff - nasal sprays, allergy pills and a box of tissues. This season, she's added a new weapon to her line of defense: an app on her smartphone.