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Acetabular labral tears are a mechanical cause of hip pain. Hip MR imaging should be performed on 3T magnets using small field of view and high-resolution imaging. If using a lower strength magnet, direct arthrography should be performed. The following should be used in the assessment for labral tear abnormalities on MR (or MR arthrography): labral morphology, abnormal T2 signal (or contrast) extension into the labral substance or chondrolabral junction. Description of the labral tear and extent of tear is useful for the hip preservation surgeon. Understanding the pitfalls around the acetabular labral complex will help avoid misinterpretation of labral tears., (Copyright © 2024 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Background and Objectives: Precise mapping of functional networks in patients with brain tumor is essential for tailoring personalized treatment strategies. Resting-state functional MRI (rs-fMRI) offers an alternative to task-based fMRI, capable of capturing multiple networks within a single acquisition, without necessitating task engagement. This study demonstrates a strong concordance between preoperative rs-fMRI maps and the gold standard intraoperative direct electric stimulation (DES) mapping during awake surgery., Methods: We conducted an analysis involving 28 patients with glioma who underwent awake surgery with DES mapping. A total of 100 DES recordings were collected to map sensorimotor (SMN), language (LANG), visual (VIS), and speech articulation cognitive domains. Preoperative rs-fMRI maps were generated using an updated version of the ReStNeuMap software, specifically designed for rs-fMRI data preprocessing and automatic detection of 7 resting-state networks (SMN, LANG, VIS, speech articulation, default mode, frontoparietal, and visuospatial). To evaluate the agreement between these networks and those mapped with invasive cortical mapping, we computed patient-specific distances between them and intraoperative DES recordings., Results: Automatically detected preoperative functional networks exhibited excellent agreement with intraoperative DES recordings. When we spatially compared DES points with their corresponding networks, we found that SMN, VIS, and speech articulatory DES points fell within the corresponding network (median distance = 0 mm), whereas for LANG a median distance of 1.6 mm was reported., Conclusion: Our findings show the remarkable consistency between key functional networks mapped noninvasively using presurgical rs-fMRI and invasive cortical mapping. This evidence highlights the utility of rs-fMRI for personalized presurgical planning, particularly in scenarios where awake surgery with DES is not feasible to protect eloquent areas during tumor resection. We have made the updated tool for automated functional network estimation publicly available, facilitating broader utilization of rs-fMRI mapping in various clinical contexts, including presurgical planning, functional reorganization over follow-up periods, and informing future treatments such as radiotherapy., (Copyright © 2024 The Author(s). Published by Wolters Kluwer Health, Inc. on behalf of the Congress of Neurological Surgeons.)

Background: Opioids inhibit motility and secretion of the gut and have been used for antidiarrheal treatment for centuries. However, the underlying mechanisms of opium tincture are not evident., Aim: To investigate the effects of opium tincture on gastrointestinal motility, intestinal volumes, and water content of different gut segments assessed by magnetic resonance imaging (MRI)., Methods: Twenty healthy volunteers were included in a randomized, placebo-controlled, crossover study of 9 days of treatment with 30 drops of opium tincture per day. MRI was performed on day 1 (before treatment) and day 9 (during treatment). Measurements included assessments of gastric volume, gastric emptying, gastric motility, small bowel volume, small bowel water content, small bowel motility, colon volume, colon water content, and whole gut transit., Key Results: Opium tincture delayed gastric emptying by a mean difference of 5.6 min [95% CI: 1.8-9.4], p = 0.004, and increased postprandial gastric meal volume (17-21%, p = 0.02). Small bowel endpoints did not change. Opium tincture delayed whole gut transit time (p = 0.027) and increased ascending colon volume by 59 mL [95% CI: 15-103], p = 0.004, and transverse colon volume by 48 mL [95% CI: 4-92], p = 0.027. T1-relaxation time of the descending colon chyme was decreased during opium treatment, indicating dryer feces (difference: -173 ms [95% CI: -336 -11], p = 0.03)., Conclusion and Inferences: Opium tincture induced changes in the stomach and colon in healthy volunteers. An improved understanding of how opioids affect gut functions may lead to a better understanding and optimized management of diarrhea., (© 2024 The Author(s). Neurogastroenterology & Motility published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.)

Study Design: A retrospective cohort study., Objective: To evaluate the mid-term effect of intervertebral disc degeneration (DD) in patients with adolescent idiopathic scoliosis (AIS) who underwent pedicle screw instrumentation (PSI) and rod derotation (RD) with direct vertebral rotation (DVR)., Summary of Background Data: Posterior spinal fusion is a mainstay of surgical treatment in AIS, and DVR is considered a main corrective maneuver for vertebral rotation. However, the mid-term effect of intervertebral DD after DVR is still unknown in AIS., Methods: A total of 336 vertebrae for 48 patients with AIS who underwent PSI and RD with DVR were retrospectively assessed for intervertebral DD. They were divided into two groups based upon intervertebral DD, defined as Pfirmann grade more than IV. The Pfirrmann grade and modic change were evaluated at the disc above the uppermost instrumented vertebra (UIV), the disc below the lowest instrumented vertebra (LIV), and the lumbar disc levels., Results: With the 11.6 years of mean follow-up, 41.7% (20/48) of patients exhibited DD, while modic changes were observed in 4.2% (2/48) of the included patients. The discs below the LIV, L4-5, and L5-S1 were significantly shown to have an increasing trend of Pfirmann grade. The preoperative thoracic kyphosis was significantly lower in the DD group (22.0°) than in the non-DD group (31.4°) ( P = 0.025) and negatively correlated with DD ( r = -0.482, P = 0.018). The Pfirrmann grade of L5-S1 showed a high level of correlation with DD ( r = 0.604, P < 0.001)., Conclusions: The degenerative change at the disc below the LIV, L4-5, and L5-S1 levels was observed following PSI and RD with DVR. Thoracic hypokyphosis may negatively influence intervertebral discs in patients with AIS required for deformity correction. Therefore, the restoration of thoracic kyphosis is important to prevent long-term DD in AIS., Competing Interests: The authors report no conflicts of interest., (Copyright © 2024 Wolters Kluwer Health, Inc. All rights reserved.)

Parental mental health is associated with children's emotion regulation (ER) and risk for psychopathology. The relationship between parental psychopathology and children's functional ER networks and whether connectivity patterns mediate the relationship between parent and youth psychopathology remains unexplored. Using resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging data from the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development Study (N = 4202, mean age = 10.0) and a multilevel approach, we analyzed the relationship between self-reported parental psychopathology and their offsprings' connectivity of four ER networks, as well as associations with self-reported youth psychopathology at a 3-year follow-up. Parental internalizing and total problems were associated with 1) higher connectivity between a subcortical-cortical integrative and ventrolateral prefrontal cortical (PFC) network, 2) lower connectivity between dorsolateral and ventrolateral PFC networks involved in cognitive aspects of ER, and 3) lower connectivity within a subcortical ER network (β = -0.05-0.04). Parental externalizing and total problems were associated with lower connectivity within the integrative network (β ext = -0.05; β tot = -0.04). Mediation analyses yielded direct effects of parental to youth psychopathology, but no mediation effect of ER network connectivity. Overall, our results show that ER network connectivity in youth is related to parental psychopathology, yet do not explain intergenerational transmission of psychopathology., Competing Interests: Declaration of Competing Interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2024 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd.. All rights reserved.)

Declarative memory encompasses episodic and semantic divisions. Episodic memory captures singular events with specific spatiotemporal relationships, whereas semantic memory houses context-independent knowledge. Behavioural and functional neuroimaging studies have revealed common and distinct neural substrates of both memory systems, implicating mesiotemporal lobe (MTL) regions such as the hippocampus and distributed neocortices. Here, we explored declarative memory system reorganization in patients with unilateral temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE) as a human disease model to test the impact of variable degrees of MTL pathology on memory function. Our cohort included 31 patients with TLE and 60 age- and sex-matched healthy controls, and all participants underwent episodic and semantic retrieval tasks during a multimodal MRI session. The functional MRI tasks were closely matched in terms of stimuli and trial design. Capitalizing on non-linear connectome gradient-mapping techniques, we derived task-based functional topographies during episodic and semantic memory states, in both the MTL and neocortical networks. Comparing neocortical and hippocampal functional gradients between TLE patients and healthy controls, we observed a marked topographic reorganization of both neocortical and MTL systems during episodic memory states. Neocortical alterations were characterized by reduced functional differentiation in TLE across lateral temporal and midline parietal cortices in both hemispheres. In the MTL, in contrast, patients presented with a more marked functional differentiation of posterior and anterior hippocampal segments ipsilateral to the seizure focus and pathological core, indicating perturbed intrahippocampal connectivity. Semantic memory reorganization was also found in bilateral lateral temporal and ipsilateral angular regions, whereas hippocampal functional topographies were unaffected. Furthermore, leveraging MRI proxies of MTL pathology, we observed alterations in hippocampal microstructure and morphology that were associated with TLE-related functional reorganization during episodic memory. Moreover, correlation analysis and statistical mediation models revealed that these functional alterations contributed to behavioural deficits in episodic memory, but again not in semantic memory in patients. Altogether, our findings suggest that semantic processes rely on distributed neocortical networks, whereas episodic processes are supported by a network involving both the hippocampus and the neocortex. Alterations of such networks can provide a compact signature of state-dependent reorganization in conditions associated with MTL damage, such as TLE., (© The Author(s) 2024. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Guarantors of Brain.)

Purpose To evaluate the performance of an artificial intelligence (AI) model in detecting overall and clinically significant prostate cancer (csPCa)-positive lesions on paired external and in-house biparametric MRI (bpMRI) scans and assess performance differences between each dataset. Materials and Methods This single-center retrospective study included patients who underwent prostate MRI at an external institution and were rescanned at the authors' institution between May 2015 and May 2022. A genitourinary radiologist performed prospective readouts on in-house MRI scans following the Prostate Imaging Reporting and Data System (PI-RADS) version 2.0 or 2.1 and retrospective image quality assessments for all scans. A subgroup of patients underwent an MRI/US fusion-guided biopsy. A bpMRI-based lesion detection AI model previously developed using a completely separate dataset was tested on both MRI datasets. Detection rates were compared between external and in-house datasets with use of the paired comparison permutation tests. Factors associated with AI detection performance were assessed using multivariable generalized mixed-effects models, incorporating features selected through forward stepwise regression based on the Akaike information criterion. Results The study included 201 male patients (median age, 66 years [IQR, 62-70 years]; prostate-specific antigen density, 0.14 ng/mL 2 [IQR, 0.10-0.22 ng/mL 2 ]) with a median interval between external and in-house MRI scans of 182 days (IQR, 97-383 days). For intraprostatic lesions, AI detected 39.7% (149 of 375) on external and 56.0% (210 of 375) on in-house MRI scans ( P < .001). For csPCa-positive lesions, AI detected 61% (54 of 89) on external and 79% (70 of 89) on in-house MRI scans ( P < .001). On external MRI scans, better overall lesion detection was associated with a higher PI-RADS score (odds ratio [OR] = 1.57; P = .005), larger lesion diameter (OR = 3.96; P < .001), better diffusion-weighted MRI quality (OR = 1.53; P = .02), and fewer lesions at MRI (OR = 0.78; P = .045). Better csPCa detection was associated with a shorter MRI interval between external and in-house scans (OR = 0.58; P = .03) and larger lesion size (OR = 10.19; P < .001). Conclusion The AI model exhibited modest performance in identifying both overall and csPCa-positive lesions on external bpMRI scans. Keywords: MR Imaging, Urinary, Prostate Supplemental material is available for this article. © RSNA, 2024.

Previous studies have reported alterations in cortical thickness in autism. However, few have included enough autistic females to determine if there are sex specific differences in cortical structure in autism. This longitudinal study aimed to investigate autistic sex differences in cortical thickness and trajectory of cortical thinning across childhood. Participants included 290 autistic (88 females) and 139 nonautistic (60 females) individuals assessed at up to 4 timepoints spanning ~2-13 years of age (918 total MRI timepoints). Estimates of cortical thickness in early and late childhood as well as the trajectory of cortical thinning were modeled using spatiotemporal linear mixed effects models of age-by-sex-by-diagnosis. Additionally, the spatial correspondence between cortical maps of sex-by-diagnosis differences and neurotypical sex differences were evaluated. Relative to their nonautistic peers, autistic females had more extensive cortical differences than autistic males. These differences involved multiple functional networks, and were mainly characterized by thicker cortex at ~3 years of age and faster cortical thinning in autistic females. Cortical regions in which autistic alterations were different between the sexes significantly overlapped with regions that differed by sex in neurotypical development. Autistic females and males demonstrated some shared differences in cortical thickness and rate of cortical thinning across childhood relative to their nonautistic peers, however these areas were relatively small compared to the widespread differences observed across the sexes. These results support evidence of sex-specific neurobiology in autism and suggest that processes that regulate sex differentiation in the neurotypical brain contribute to sex differences in the etiology of autism., (© 2024. The Author(s).)

Purpose: To evaluate 3D gas-exchange functional imaging characteristics using 129 Xe MRI in a group of study participants with chronic hypersensitivity pneumonitis (CHP) as compared with healthy control participants., Methods: In this prospective study, 11 participants with clinical and CT findings of CHP (4M 7F, mean age 67 ± 6.1 years) as well as 41 healthy subjects (25M 16F, mean age 44 ± 18 years) were enrolled between 2017 and 2022 and underwent 129 Xe MRI. Three-dimensional images of ventilation, interstitial membrane uptake, and RBC transfer were rendered into quantitative 3D maps relative to a healthy reference cohort. In addition, 129 Xe spectroscopy was used to assess the RBC:membrane ratio (RBC:M), the oxygen-dependent RBC chemical shift, and cardiogenically-driven RBC oscillation amplitude. Differences between the CHP participants and healthy subjects were assessed using the two-sample t-test or Wilcoxon rank-sum test as appropriate., Results: CHP participants demonstrated significant differences in 6 parameters (p < 0.001) including regions of reduced ventilation, increased membrane uptake, and reduced RBC transfer as compared to healthy subjects. Gas exchange abnormalities measured on spectroscopy included a reduced RBC:M, reduced RBC chemical shift, and increased RBC oscillation amplitude., Conclusion: In participants with CHP, 129 Xe MRI demonstrated gas exchange abnormalities common to other fibrotic lung diseases including increased membrane uptake, deficits in RBC transfer, and reduced RBC:M. However, CHP participants also exhibited prominent ventilation abnormalities, which may be reflective of the airway-centric nature of the disease. Further, the high variability observed in the membrane uptake could suggest varying degrees of disease progression or activity., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare the following financial interests/personal relationships which may be considered as potential competing interests: Bastiaan Driehuys reports a relationship with Polarean that includes: consulting or advisory and equity or stocks. David Mummy reports a relationship with Polarean that includes: consulting or advisory. If there are other authors, they declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2024 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Pulmonary hypertension (PH) remains a challenging condition to diagnose, classify and treat. Current approaches to the assessment of PH include echocardiography, ventilation/perfusion scintigraphy, cross-sectional imaging using computed tomography and magnetic resonance imaging, and right heart catheterisation. However, these approaches only provide an indirect readout of the primary pathology of the disease: abnormal vascular remodelling in the pulmonary circulation. With the advent of newer imaging techniques, there is a shift toward increased utilisation of noninvasive high-resolution modalities that offer a more comprehensive cardiopulmonary assessment and improved visualisation of the different components of the pulmonary circulation. In this review, we explore advances in imaging of the pulmonary vasculature and their potential clinical translation. These include advances in diagnosis and assessing treatment response, as well as strategies that allow reduced radiation exposure and implementation of artificial intelligence technology. These emerging modalities hold the promise of developing a deeper understanding of pulmonary vascular disease and the impact of comorbidities. They also have the potential to improve patient outcomes by reducing time to diagnosis, refining classification, monitoring treatment response and improving our understanding of disease mechanisms., Competing Interests: Conflict of interest: S. Rajagopal reports grants from United Therapeutics, Merck, Janssen and Gossamer Bio, royalties or licences from Polarean, consultancy fees from AERAMI Therapeutics, Liquidia, Gossamer Bio, Merck, Insmed, Polarean, Janssen and Visterra, payment or honoraria for lectures, presentations, manuscript writing or educational events from TotalCME, participation on a data safety monitoring board or advisory board with Aerami Therapeutics, and stock (or stock options) with APIE Therapeutics. H.J. Bogaard reports grants from Janssen, MSD, Novartis and Ferrer. M.S.M. Elbaz reports grants from NIH/NHLBI, support for attending meetings from the World Symposium of Pulmonary Hypertension (WSPH), patents planned, issued or pending (US Patent Application number 17/309,246: noninvasive quantitative flow mapping using a virtual catheter volume), and is a member of the SCMR Science Committee and task force 6 of the 7th WSPH. B.H. Freed reports grants from Cardiovascular Medical Research and Education Fund, and consultancy fees from Change Healthcare. E.J.R. van Beek reports consultancy fees from Aidence (Deep Health) and Lunit, payment or honoraria for lectures, presentations, manuscript writing or educational events from AstraZeneca, and is founder/owner of QCTIS Ltd. D.G. Kiely reports grants from Janssen Pharmaceuticals, National Institute of Health Research Sheffield Biomedical Research Centre and Ferrer, consultancy fees from Janssen Pharmaceuticals, Ferrer, Altavant, MSD, United Therapeutics and Liquidia, payment or honoraria for lectures, presentations, manuscript writing or educational events from Janssen Pharmaceuticals, Ferrer, Altavant, MSD and United Therapeutics, support for attending meetings from Janssen, Ferrer, MSD and United Therapeutics, participation on a data safety monitoring board or advisory board with Janssen, MSD and Liquidia, and is member of Clinical Reference Group for Specialised Respiratory Medicine (NHS England) and Lead of UK National Audit of Pulmonary Hypertension. The remaining authors have no potential conflicts of interest to disclose., (Copyright ©The authors 2024.)

Background: Growing health care challenges resulting from a rapidly expanding aging population necessitate examining effective rehabilitation techniques that mitigate age-related comorbidity and improve quality of life. To date, exercise is one of a few proven interventions known to attenuate age-related declines in cognitive and sensorimotor functions critical to sustained independence., Objective: This work aims to implement a multimodal imaging approach to better understand the mechanistic underpinnings of the beneficial exercise-induced adaptations to sedentary older adults' brains and behaviors. Due to the complex cerebral and vascular dynamics that encompass neuroplastic change with aging and exercise, we propose an imaging protocol that will model exercise-induced changes to cerebral perfusion, cerebral vascular reactivity (CVR), and cognitive and sensorimotor task-dependent functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) after prescribed exercise., Methods: Sedentary older adults (aged 65-80 years) were randomly assigned to either a 12-week aerobic-based interval-based cycling intervention or a 12-week balance and stretching intervention. Assessments of cardiovascular fitness used the YMCA submaximal VO 2 test, basal cerebral perfusion using arterial spin labeling (ASL), CVR using hypercapnic fMRI, and cortical activation using fMRI during verbal fluency and motor tapping tasks. A battery of cognitive-executive and motor function tasks outside the scanning environment will be performed before and after the interventions., Results: Our studies and others show that improved cardiovascular fitness in older adults results in improved outcomes related to physical and cognitive health as well as quality of life. A consistent but unexplained finding in many of these studies is a change in cortical activation patterns during task-based fMRI, which corresponds with improved task performance (cognitive-executive and motor). We hypothesize that the 12-week aerobic exercise intervention will increase basal perfusion and improve CVR through a greater magnitude of reactivity in brain areas susceptible to neural and vascular decline (inferior frontal and motor cortices) in previously sedentary older adults. To differentiate between neural and vascular adaptations in these regions, we will map changes in basal perfusion and CVR over the inferior frontal and the motor cortices-regions we have previously shown to be beneficially altered during fMRI BOLD (blood oxygen level dependent), such as verbal fluency and motor tapping, through improved cardiovascular fitness., Conclusions: Exercise is one of the most impactful interventions for improving physical and cognitive health in aging. This study aims to better understand the mechanistic underpinnings of improved health and function of the cerebrovascular system. If our hypothesis of improved perfusion and cerebrovascular reactivity following a 12-week aerobic exercise intervention is supported, it would add critically important insights into the potential of exercise to improve brain health in aging and could inform exercise prescription for older adults at risk for neurodegenerative disease brought on by cerebrovascular dysfunction., Trial Registration: ClinicalTrials.gov NCT05932069; https://clinicaltrials.gov/study/NCT05932069., International Registered Report Identifier (irrid): DERR1-10.2196/58316., (©Medina Oneyi Bello, Kevin Michael Mammino, Mark Anthony Vernon, Daniel G Wakeman, Chanse Aerius Denmon, Lisa Crystal Krishnamurthy, Venkatagiri Krishnamurthy, Keith Matthew McGregor, Thomas Samuel Novak, Joe Robert Nocera. Originally published in JMIR Research Protocols (https://www.researchprotocols.org), 26.09.2024.)

Introduction: The neural underpinnings underlying individual differences in nicotine-enhanced reward sensitivity (NERS) and smoking progression are poorly understood. Thus, we investigated whether brain resting-state functional connectivity (rsFC.) during smoking abstinence predicts NERS and smoking progression in young light smokers. We hypothesized that high rsFC between brain areas with high densities of nicotinic receptors (insula, anterior cingulate cortex [ACC], hippocampus, thalamus) and areas involved in reward-seeking (nucleus accumbens [NAcc], prefrontal cortex [PFC]) would predict NERS and smoking progression., Aims and Methods: Young light smokers (N = 64, age 18-24, M = 1.89 cigarettes/day) participated in the study. These individuals smoked between 5 and 35 cigarettes per week and lifetime use never exceeded 35 cigarettes per week. Their rsFC was assessed using functional magnetic resonance imaging after 14 hours of nicotine deprivation. Subjects also completed a probabilistic reward task after smoking a placebo on 1 day and a regular cigarette on another day., Results: The probabilistic-reward-task assessed greater NERS was associated with greater rsFC between the right anterior PFC and right NAcc, but with reduced rsFC between the ACC and left inferior prefrontal gyrus and the insula and ACC. Decreased rsFC within the salience network (ACC and insula) predicted increased smoking progression across 18 months and greater NERS., Conclusions: These findings provide the first evidence that differences in rsFCs in young light smokers are associated with nicotine-enhanced reward sensitivity and smoking progression., Clinical Trial Registration: NCT02129387 (preregistered hypothesis: www.clinicaltrials.gov)., Implications: Weaker rsFC within the salience network predicted greater NERS and smoking progression. These findings suggest that salience network rsFC and drug-enhanced reward sensitivity may be useful tools and potential endophenotypes for reward sensitivity and drug-dependence research., (© The Author(s) 2024. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Society for Research on Nicotine and Tobacco. All rights reserved. For commercial re-use, please contact reprints@oup.com for reprints and translation rights for reprints. All other permissions can be obtained through our RightsLink service via the Permissions link on the article page on our site—for further information please contact journals.permissions@oup.com.)

Purpose: Manual reconstruction (MR) of the vastus lateralis (VL) muscle cross-sectional area (CSA) from sequential ultrasound (US) images is accessible, is reproducible, and has concurrent validity with magnetic resonance imaging. However, this technique requires numerous controls and procedures during image acquisition and reconstruction, making it laborious and time-consuming. The aim of this study was to determine the concurrent validity of VL CSA assessments between MR and computer vision-based automated reconstruction (AR) of CSA from sequential images of the VL obtained by US., Methods: The images from each sequence were manually rotated to align the fascia between images and thus visualize the VL CSA. For the AR, an artificial neural network model was utilized to segment areas of interest in the image, such as skin, fascia, deep aponeurosis, and femur. This segmentation was crucial to impose necessary constraints for the main assembly phase. At this stage, an image registration application, combined with differential evolution, was employed to achieve appropriate adjustments between the images. Next, the VL CSA obtained from the MR ( n = 488) and AR ( n = 488) techniques was used to determine their concurrent validity., Results: Our findings demonstrated a low coefficient of variation (CV) (1.51%) for AR compared with MR. The Bland-Altman plot showed low bias and close limits of agreement (+1.18 cm 2 , -1.19 cm 2 ), containing more than 95% of the data points., Conclusions: The AR technique is valid compared with MR when measuring VL CSA in a heterogeneous sample., (Copyright © 2024 by the American College of Sports Medicine.)

Objective: MRI utilization in the United States is relatively higher than in other parts of the world and inpatient MRI utilization is particularly difficult to manage given the lack of direct reimbursement. Body MRI studies present an opportunity to reduce inpatient MRI utilization since they are generally the least emergent. Our objective was to use a targeted questionnaire to probe the necessity of inpatient body MRI orders and present an opportunity to either cancel them or transition them to the outpatient realm METHODS: A 9-item questionnaire was devised asking questions about the urgency of the inpatient MRI order including the urgent management question, an inpatient procedure or whether it was recommended by a consultant. Peer-to-peer discussion walking through each of the questions was conducted by radiology housestaff with the ordering clinicians and responses recorded., Results: 845 recorded responses reported a lack of specific clinical question in 23.9% of orders, 68.9% were recommended by a non-radiology consulting service and 16.1% were recommended by radiology studies. 17.0% orders were felt to be outpatient appropriate and 23.3% were considered possibly appropriate for the outpatient setting. 3.9% were canceled and 4.9% were transitioned to outpatient orders., Discussion: Engaging in a focused discussion about the urgency and appropriateness of an inpatient MRI body order following a list of scripted questions has the potential to reduce utilization. This approach also highlights the relatively high rate of indication uncertainty among ordering clinicians and the central role of consultants in prompting orders., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2024 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Introduction: Congenital enophthalmos is a rare condition characterized by posterior displacement of the globe, often associated with bony orbital anomalies or whole globe development defects. The purpose of this report is to present two unrelated cases of congenital enophthalmos secondary to anomalous accessory orbital bands and to describe characteristics of orbital imaging that differentiate this condition from the other causes., Methods: The case records of two patients who presented with congenital enophthalmos and were discovered to have anomalous accessory orbital extraocular muscle bands were reviewed. The clinical features, initial diagnosis, high resolution magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) findings, and surgical outcomes were noted. A 3-dimensional reconstruction model was used to understand the approach and surgical management in one of the cases., Results: Both patients presented with unilateral severe enophthalmos, globe retraction, and restricted ocular motility in all directions since birth. High-resolution MRI of the orbits revealed a short anomalous band, isointense to the muscle, arising from a rectus muscle belly and attaching to the posteroinferior part of the globe adjacent to the optic nerve. The caliber of the extraocular muscles and ocular motor nerves was normal. In one patient, surgery was not pursued due to the extreme posterior location of the band with proximity to the optic nerve. In the other patient, the deviation did not improve, despite successfully severing the accessory band, due to extensive scarring., Conclusion: Anomalous accessory orbital extraocular muscle bands are a rare and often overlooked cause of congenital enophthalmos when associated with limited ocular motility. Imaging the orbit can aid in diagnosis and help differentiate it from other causes. Safe surgical approaches to address the problem are limited, and available approaches may not be effective. These two cases highlight that the management of accessory extraocular muscle bands causing enophthalmos can be extremely challenging and difficult to improve even with intensive surgical intervention.

Introduction: Computational head injury models are promising tools for understanding and predicting traumatic brain injuries. However, most available head injury models are "average" models that employ a single set of head geometry (e.g., 50th-percentile U.S. male) without considering variability in these parameters across the human population. A significant variability of head shapes exists in U.S. Army soldiers, evident from the Anthropometric Survey of U.S. Army Personnel (ANSUR II). The objective of this study is to elucidate the effects of head shape on the predicted risk of traumatic brain injury from computational head injury models., Materials and Methods: Magnetic resonance imaging scans of 25 human subjects are collected. These images are registered to the standard MNI152 brain atlas, and the resulting transformation matrix components (called head shape parameters) are used to quantify head shapes of the subjects. A generative machine learning model is used to generate 25 additional head shape parameter datasets to augment our database. Head injury models are developed for these head shapes, and a rapid injurious head rotation event is simulated to obtain several brain injury predictor variables (BIPVs): Peak cumulative maximum principal strain (CMPS), average CMPS, and the volume fraction of brain exceeding an injurious CMPS threshold. A Gaussian process regression model is trained between head shape parameters and BIPVs, which is then used to study the relative sensitivity of the various BIPVs on individual head shape parameters. We distinguish head shape parameters into 2 types: Scaling components ${T&#95;{xx}}$, ${T&#95;{yy}}$, and ${T&#95;{zz}}$ that capture the breadth, length, and height of the head, respectively, and shearing components (${T&#95;{xy}},{T&#95;{xz}},{T&#95;{yx}},{T&#95;{yz}},{T&#95;{zx}}$, and ${T&#95;{zy}}$) that capture the relative skewness of the head shape., Results: An overall positive correlation is evident between scaling components and BIPVs. Notably, a very high, positive correlation is seen between the BIPVs and the head volume. As an example, a 57% increase in peak CMPS was noted between the smallest and the largest investigated head volume parameters. The variation in shearing components ${T&#95;{xy}},{T&#95;{xz}},{T&#95;{yx}},{T&#95;{yz}},{T&#95;{zx}}$, and ${T&#95;{zy}}$ on average does not cause notable changes in the BIPVs. From the Gaussian process regression model, all 3 BIPVs showed an increasing trend with each of the 3 scaling components, but the BIPVs are found to be most sensitive to the height dimension of the head. From the Sobol sensitivity analysis, the ${T&#95;{zz}}$ scaling parameter contributes nearly 60% to the total variance in peak and average CMPS; ${T&#95;{yy}}$ contributes approximately 20%, whereas ${T&#95;{xx}}$ contributes less than 5%. The remaining contribution is from the 6 shearing components. Unlike peak and average CMPS, the VF-CMPS BIPV is associated with relatively evenly distributed Sobol indices across the 3 scaling parameters. Furthermore, the contribution of shearing components on the total variance in this case is negligible., Conclusions: Head shape has a considerable influence on the injury predictions of computational head injury models. Available "average" head injury models based on a 50th-percentile U.S. male are likely associated with considerable uncertainty. In general, larger head sizes correspond to greater BIPV magnitudes, which point to potentially a greater injury risk under rapid neck rotation for people with larger heads., (© The Association of Military Surgeons of the United States 2024. All rights reserved. For commercial re-use, please contact reprints@oup.com for reprints and translation rights for reprints. All other permissions can be obtained through our RightsLink service via the Permissions link on the article page on our site–for further information please contact journals.permissions@oup.com.)

Background: We aimed to evaluate long-term outcomes of gamma knife radiosurgery (GKS) for cerebral cavernous malformations (CCMs)., Methods: Among the 233 CCM patients who underwent GKS, 79 adult patients (96 lesions) followed for over 10 years were included and analyzed retrospectively. Annual hemorrhage rate (AHR) was analyzed the entire cohort of 233 patients and the subset of 79 enrolled patients by dividing lesions into overall CCM lesions and brainstem lesions. AHR, neurologic outcome, adverse radiation effect (ARE), and changes of lesions in magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) were compared before and after GKS. Cox-regression analysis was performed to identify risk factors for hemorrhage following GKS., Results: Mean follow-up duration of 79 enrolled patients was 14 years (range, 10-23 years). The AHR of all CCMs for entire cohort at each time point was 17.8% (pre-GKS), 5.9% (≤ 2 years post-GKS), 1.8% (≤ 10 years post-GKS). The AHR of all CCM for 79 enrolled patients was 21.4% (pre-GKS), 3.8% (2 years post-GKS), 1.4% (10 years post-GKS), and 2.3% (> 10 years post-GKS). The AHR of brainstem cavernous malformation (CM) for entire cohort at each time point was 22.4% (pre-GKS), 10.1% (≤ 2 years post-GKS), 3.2% (≤ 10 years post-GKS). The AHR of brainstem CM for 79 enrolled patients was 27.2% (pre-GKS), 5.8% (2 years post-GKS), 3.4% (10 years post-GKS), and 3.5% (> 10 years post-GKS). Out of the 79 enrolled patients, 35 presented with focal neurologic deficits at the initial clinical visit. Among these patients, 74.3% showed recovery at the last follow-up. Symptomatic ARE occurred in five (6.4%) patients. No mortality occurred. Most lesions were decreased in size at the last follow-up MRI. Previous hemorrhage history (hazard ratio [HR], 8.38; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.07-65.88; P = 0.043), and brainstem location (HR, 3.10; 95% CI, 1.26-7.64; P = 0.014) were significant risk factors for hemorrhage event., Conclusion: GKS for CCM showed favorable long-term outcomes. GKS should be considered for CCM, especially when it has a previous hemorrhage history and brainstem location., Competing Interests: The authors have no potential conflicts of interest to disclose., (© 2024 The Korean Academy of Medical Sciences.)

Objective: To assess impact of image quality on prostate cancer extraprostatic extension (EPE) detection on MRI using a deep learning-based AI algorithm., Materials and Methods: This retrospective, single institution study included patients who were imaged with mpMRI and subsequently underwent radical prostatectomy from June 2007 to August 2022. One genitourinary radiologist prospectively evaluated each patient using the NCI EPE grading system. Each T2WI was classified as low- or high-quality by a previously developed AI algorithm. Fisher's exact tests were performed to compare EPE detection metrics between low- and high-quality images. Univariable and multivariable analyses were conducted to assess the predictive value of image quality for pathological EPE., Results: A total of 773 consecutive patients (median age 61 [IQR 56-67] years) were evaluated. At radical prostatectomy, 23% (180/773) of patients had EPE at pathology, and 41% (131/318) of positive EPE calls on mpMRI were confirmed to have EPE. The AI algorithm classified 36% (280/773) of T2WIs as low-quality and 64% (493/773) as high-quality. For EPE grade ≥ 1, high-quality T2WI significantly improved specificity for EPE detection (72% [95% CI 67-76%] vs. 63% [95% CI 56-69%], P = 0.03), but did not significantly affect sensitivity (72% [95% CI 62-80%] vs. 75% [95% CI 63-85%]), positive predictive value (44% [95% CI 39-49%] vs. 38% [95% CI 32-43%]), or negative predictive value (89% [95% CI 86-92%] vs. 89% [95% CI 85-93%]). Sensitivity, specificity, PPV, and NPV for EPE grades ≥ 2 and ≥ 3 did not show significant differences attributable to imaging quality. For NCI EPE grade 1, high-quality images (OR 3.05, 95% CI 1.54-5.86; P < 0.001) demonstrated a stronger association with pathologic EPE than low-quality images (OR 1.76, 95% CI 0.63-4.24; P = 0.24)., Conclusion: Our study successfully employed a deep learning-based AI algorithm to classify image quality of prostate MRI and demonstrated that better quality T2WI was associated with more accurate prediction of EPE at final pathology., (© 2024. This is a U.S. Government work and not under copyright protection in the US; foreign copyright protection may apply.)

Objective: Deep gluteal syndrome (DGS) is a medical diagnosis in which the pathoanatomy of the subgluteal space contributes to pain. The growing recognition that gluteal neuropathies can be associated with the presence of a bone-neural conflict with irritation or compression may allow us to shed some light on this pathology. This study aims to determine whether the location of the sciatic nerve (SN) in relation to the ischial spine (IS) contributes to the development of DGS., Methods: The SN - IS relationship was analyzed based on magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) in 15 surgical patients (SPs), who underwent piriformis release, and in 30 control patients who underwent MRI of the pelvis for reasons unrelated to sciatica. The SN exit from the greater sciatic foramen was classified as either zone A (medial to the IS); zone B (on the IS); or zone C (lateral to the IS)., Results: The SN was significantly closer to the IS in SPs than in MRI controls (P = 0.014). When analyzing patients of similar age, SNs in SPs were significantly closer (P = 0.0061) to the IS, and located in zone B significantly more (P = 0.0216) as compared to MRI controls. Patients who underwent surgery for piriformis release showed a significant decrease in pain postoperatively (P < 0.0001)., Conclusions: The results from this study suggest that the relationship between the IS and SN may play a role in the development of DGS. This may also help establish which patients would benefit more from surgical intervention., (Copyright © 2024. Published by Elsevier Inc.)

Background: There is an imminent need to identify neural markers during preadolescence that are linked to developing depression during adolescence, especially among youth at elevated familial risk. However, longitudinal studies remain scarce and exhibit mixed findings. Here we aimed to elucidate functional connectivity (FC) patterns among preadolescents that interact with familial depression risk to predict depression two years later., Methods: 9-10 year-olds in the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development (ABCD) Study were classified as healthy (i.e., no lifetime psychiatric diagnoses) at high familial risk for depression (HR; n=559) or at low familial risk for psychopathology (LR; n=1203). Whole-brain seed-to-voxel resting-state FC patterns with the amygdala, putamen, nucleus accumbens, and caudate were calculated. Multi-level, mixed-effects regression analyses were conducted to test whether FC at ages 9-10 interacted with familial risk to predict depression symptoms at ages 11-12., Results: HR youth demonstrated stronger associations between preadolescent FC and adolescent depression symptoms (ps<0.001) as compared to LR youth (ps>0.001), primarily among amygdala/striatal FC with visual and sensory/somatomotor networks., Conclusions: Preadolescent amygdala and striatal FC may be useful biomarkers of adolescent-onset depression, particularly for youth with family histories of depression. This research may point to neurobiologically-informed approaches to prevention and intervention for depression in adolescents., Competing Interests: Declaration of Competing Interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2024 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd.. All rights reserved.)

Ultrashort echo time (UTE) MRI can quantify the major proton pool densities in cortical bone, including total (TWPD), bound (BWPD), and pore water (PWPD) proton densities, as well as the macromolecular proton density (MMPD), associated with the collagen content, which is calculated using macromolecular fraction (MMF) from UTE magnetization transfer (UTE-MT) modeling. This study aimed to investigate the differences in water and collagen contents in tibial cortical bone, between female osteopenia (OPe) patients, osteoporosis (OPo) patients, and young participants (Young). Being postmenopausal and above 55 yr old were the inclusion criteria for OPe and OPo groups. The tibial shaft of 14 OPe (72.5 ± 6.8 yr old), 31 OPo (72.0 ± 6.4 yr old), and 31 young subjects (28.0 ± 6.1 yr old) were scanned using a knee coil on a clinical 3T scanner. Basic UTE, inversion recovery UTE, and UTE-MT sequences were performed. Investigated biomarkers were compared between groups using Kruskal-Wallis test. Spearman's correlation coefficients were calculated between the TH DXA T-score and UTE-MRI results. MMF, BWPD, and MMPD were significantly lower in OPo patients than in the young group, whereas T1, TWPD, and PWPD were significantly higher in OPo patients. The largest OPo/Young average percentage differences were found in MMF (41.9%), PWPD (103.5%), and MMPD (64.0%). PWPD was significantly higher (50.7%), while BWPD was significantly lower (16.4%) in OPe than the Young group on average. MMF was found to be significantly lower (27%) in OPo patients compared with OPe group. T1, MMF, TWPD, PWPD, and MMPD values significantly correlated with the TH DXA T-scores (provided by the patients and only available for OPe and OPo patients). DXA T-score showed the highest correlations with PWPD (R = 0.55) and MMF (R = 0.56) values. TWPD, PWPD, and MMF estimated using the UTE-MRI sequences were recommended to evaluate individuals with OPe and OPo., (© The Author(s) 2024. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the American Society for Bone and Mineral Research. All rights reserved. For permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oup.com.)

Poor inhibitory control contributes to deficits in emotion regulation, which are often targeted by treatments for major depressive disorder (MDD), including cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT). Brain regions that contribute to inhibitory control and emotion regulation overlap; thus, inhibitory control might relate to response to CBT. In this study, we examined whether baseline inhibitory control and resting state functional connectivity (rsFC) within overlapping emotion regulation-inhibitory control regions predicted treatment response to internet-based CBT (iCBT). Participants with MDD were randomly assigned to iCBT (N = 30) or a monitored attention control (MAC) condition (N = 30). Elastic net regression was used to predict post-treatment Patient Health Questionnaire-9 (PHQ-9) scores from baseline variables, including demographic variables, PHQ-9 scores, Flanker effects (interference, sequential dependency, post-error slowing), and rsFC between the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex, bilateral anterior insula (AI), and right temporoparietal junction (TPJ). Essential prognostic predictor variables retained in the elastic net regression included treatment group, gender, Flanker interference response time (RT), right AI-TPJ rsFC, and left AI-right AI rsFC. Prescriptive predictor variables retained included interactions between treatment group and baseline PHQ-9 scores, age, gender, Flanker RT, sequential dependency effects on accuracy, post-error accuracy, right AI-TPJ rsFC, and left AI-right AI rsFC. Inhibitory control and rsFC within inhibitory control-emotion regulation regions predicted reduced symptom severity following iCBT, and these effects were stronger in the iCBT group than in the MAC group. These findings contribute to a growing literature indicating that stronger inhibitory control at baseline predicts better outcomes to psychotherapy, including iCBT., (© 2024. The Author(s).)

Facioscapulohumeral muscular dystrophy (FSHD) affects roughly 1 in 7500 individuals. While at the population level there is a general pattern of affected muscles, there is substantial heterogeneity in muscle expression across- and within-patients. There can also be substantial variation in the pattern of fat and water signal intensity within a single muscle. While quantifying individual muscles across their full length using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) represents the optimal approach to follow disease progression and evaluate therapeutic response, the ability to automate this process has been limited. The goal of this work was to develop and optimize an artificial intelligence-based image segmentation approach to comprehensively measure muscle volume, fat fraction, fat fraction distribution, and elevated short-tau inversion recovery signal in the musculature of patients with FSHD. Intra-rater, inter-rater, and scan-rescan analyses demonstrated that the developed methods are robust and precise. Representative cases and derived metrics of volume, cross-sectional area, and 3D pixel-maps demonstrate unique intramuscular patterns of disease. Future work focuses on leveraging these AI methods to include upper body output and aggregating individual muscle data across studies to determine best-fit models for characterizing progression and monitoring therapeutic modulation of MRI biomarkers., (© 2024. The Author(s).)

Purpose: Prostate-specific membrane antigen (PSMA)-targeting PET radiotracers reveal physiologic uptake in the urinary system, potentially misrepresenting activity in the prostatic urethra as an intraprostatic lesion. This study examined the correlation between midline 18 F-DCFPyL activity in the prostate and hyperintensity on T2-weighted (T2W) MRI as an indication of retained urine in the prostatic urethra., Patients and Methods: Eighty-five patients who underwent both 18 F-DCFPyL PSMA PET/CT and prostate MRI between July 2017 and September 2023 were retrospectively analyzed for midline radiotracer activity and retained urine on postvoid T2W MRIs. Fisher's exact tests and unpaired t tests were used to compare residual urine presence and prostatic urethra measurements between patients with and without midline radiotracer activity. The influence of anatomical factors including prostate volume and urethral curvature on urinary stagnation was also explored., Results: Midline activity on PSMA PET imaging was seen in 14 patients included in the case group, whereas the remaining 71 with no midline activity constituted the control group. A total of 71.4% (10/14) and 29.6% (21/71) of patients in the case and control groups had urethral hyperintensity on T2W MRI, respectively ( P < 0.01). Patients in the case group had significantly larger mean urethral dimensions, larger prostate volumes, and higher incidence of severe urethral curvature compared with the controls., Conclusions: Stagnated urine within the prostatic urethra is a potential confounding factor on PSMA PET scans. Integrating PET imaging with T2W MRI can mitigate false-positive calls, especially as PSMA PET/CT continues to gain traction in diagnosing localized prostate cancer., Competing Interests: Conflicts of interest and sources of funding: none declared., (Copyright © 2024 Wolters Kluwer Health, Inc. All rights reserved.)

Purpose: Field-to-susceptibility inversion in quantitative susceptibility mapping (QSM) is ill-posed and needs numerical stabilization through either regularization or oversampling by acquiring data at three or more object orientations. Calculation Of Susceptibility through Multiple Orientations Sampling (COSMOS) is an established oversampling approach and regarded as QSM gold standard. It achieves a well-conditioned inverse problem, requiring rotations by 0°, 60° and 120° in the yz-plane. However, this is impractical in vivo, where head rotations are typically restricted to a range of ±25°. Non-ideal sampling degrades the conditioning with residual streaking artifacts whose mitigation needs further regularization. Moreover, susceptibility anisotropy in white matter is not considered in the COSMOS model, which may introduce additional bias. The current work presents a thorough investigation of these effects in primate brain., Methods: Gradient-recalled echo (GRE) data of an entire fixed chimpanzee brain were acquired at 7 T (350 μm resolution, 10 orientations) including ideal COSMOS sampling and realistic rotations in vivo. Comparisons of the results included ideal COSMOS, in-vivo feasible acquisitions with 3-8 orientations and single-orientation iLSQR QSM., Results: In-vivo feasible and optimal COSMOS yielded high-quality susceptibility maps with increased SNR resulting from averaging multiple acquisitions. COSMOS reconstructions from non-ideal rotations about a single axis required additional L2-regularization to mitigate residual streaking artifacts., Conclusion: In view of unconsidered anisotropy effects, added complexity of the reconstruction, and the general challenge of multi-orientation acquisitions, advantages of sub-optimal COSMOS schemes over regularized single-orientation QSM appear limited in in-vivo settings., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare no competing interest., (Copyright © 2024 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Objective: To assess the performance of morphologic and hypointense signal changes on MRI to predict grades and types of acetabular cartilage damage in the chondrolabral transitional zone (TZ) of the hip identified at arthroscopy., Materials and Methods: This retrospective single-center study reviewed conventional 3T MRI hip studies from individuals with symptomatic femoroacetabular impingement (FAI) and subsequent hip arthroscopy surgery within 6 months. Independent review was made by three radiologists for the presence of morphologic damage or a hypointense signal lesion in the TZ on MRI. Fleiss' kappa statistic was used to assess inter-reader agreement. The degree of TZ surfacing damage (modified Outerbridge grades 1-4) and presence of non-surfacing wave sign at arthroscopic surgery were collected. Relationship between sensitivity and lesion grade was examined., Results: One hundred thirty-six MRI hip studies from 40 males and 74 females were included (mean age 28.5 years, age range 13-54 years). MRI morphologic lesions had a sensitivity of 64.9-71.6% and specificity of 48.4-67.7% for arthroscopic surfacing lesions, with greater sensitivity seen for higher grade lesions. Low sensitivity was seen for wave sign lesions (34.5-51.7%). MRI hypointense signal lesions had a sensitivity of 26.3-62% and specificity of 43.8-78.0% for any lesion. Inter-reader agreement was moderate for morphologic lesions (k = 0.601) and poor for hypointense signal lesions (k = 0.097)., Conclusion: Morphologic cartilage damage in the TZ on MRI had moderate sensitivity for any cartilage lesion, better sensitivity for higher grade lesions, and poor sensitivity for wave sign lesions. The diagnostic value of hypointense signal lesions was uncertain., (© 2024. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to International Skeletal Society (ISS).)

The shrimp sign is characterized by a well-defined lesion in the deep cerebellar white matter, with hyperintense signal on T2- and hypointense signal on T1-weighted imaging, abutting and outlining the dentate nucleus, unilaterally or bilaterally. This sign has high sensitivity and specificity for cerebellar progressive multifocal leukoencephalopathy (PML) within the correct clinical scenario. In this article, we present a case of cerebellar PML in a woman living with human immunodeficiency virus, who was not using antiretroviral therapy, and presented the shrimp sign on brain MRI., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no competing interests., (Copyright © 2024 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Objectives: To investigate whether a history of traumatic brain injury (TBI) is associated with greater long-term grey-matter loss in patients with mild cognitive impairment (MCI)., Methods: 85 patients with MCI were identified, including 26 with a previous history of traumatic brain injury (MCI[TBI-]) and 59 without (MCI[TBI+]). Cortical thickness was evaluated by segmenting T1-weighted MRI scans acquired longitudinally over a 2-year period. Bayesian multilevel modelling was used to evaluate group differences in baseline cortical thickness and longitudinal change, as well as group differences in neuropsychological measures of executive function., Results: At baseline, the MCI[TBI+] group had less grey matter within right entorhinal, left medial orbitofrontal and inferior temporal cortex areas bilaterally. Longitudinally, the MCI[TBI+] group also exhibited greater longitudinal declines in left rostral middle frontal, the left caudal middle frontal and left lateral orbitofrontal areas sover the span of 2 years (median = 1-2%, 90%HDI [-0.01%: -0.001%], probability of direction (PD) = 90-99%). The MCI[TBI+] group also displayed greater longitudinal declines in Trail-Making-Test (TMT)-derived ratio (median: 0.737%, 90%HDI: [0.229%: 1.31%], PD = 98.8%) and differences scores (median: 20.6%, 90%HDI: [-5.17%: 43.2%], PD = 91.7%)., Conclusions: Our findings support the notion that patients with MCI and a history of TBI are at risk of accelerated neurodegeneration, displaying greatest evidence for cortical atrophy within the left middle frontal and lateral orbitofrontal frontal cortex. Importantly, these results suggest that long-term TBI-mediated atrophy is more pronounced in areas vulnerable to TBI-related mechanical injury, highlighting their potential relevance for diagnostic forms of intervention in TBI., (© 2024. Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature.)

To understand the neurocognitive mechanisms that underlie heterogeneity in cognitive ageing, recent scientific efforts have led to a growing public availability of imaging cohort data. The Advanced BRain Imaging on ageing and Memory (ABRIM) project aims to add to these existing datasets by taking an adult lifespan approach to provide a cross-sectional, normative database with a particular focus on connectivity, myelinization and iron content of the brain in concurrence with cognitive functioning, mechanisms of reserve, and sleep-wake rhythms. ABRIM freely shares MRI and behavioural data from 295 participants between 18-80 years, stratified by age decade and sex (median age 52, IQR 36-66, 53.20% females). The ABRIM MRI collection consists of both the raw and pre-processed structural and functional MRI data to facilitate data usage among both expert and non-expert users. The ABRIM behavioural collection includes measures of cognitive functioning (i.e., global cognition, processing speed, executive functions, and memory), proxy measures of cognitive reserve (e.g., educational attainment, verbal intelligence, and occupational complexity), and various self-reported questionnaires (e.g., on depressive symptoms, pain, and the use of memory strategies in daily life and during a memory task). In a sub-sample (n = 120), we recorded sleep-wake rhythms using an actigraphy device (Actiwatch 2, Philips Respironics) for a period of 7 consecutive days. Here, we provide an in-depth description of our study protocol, pre-processing pipelines, and data availability. ABRIM provides a cross-sectional database on healthy participants throughout the adult lifespan, including numerous parameters relevant to improve our understanding of cognitive ageing. Therefore, ABRIM enables researchers to model the advanced imaging parameters and cognitive topologies as a function of age, identify the normal range of values of such parameters, and to further investigate the diverse mechanisms of reserve and resilience., Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist., (Copyright: © 2024 Jansen et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.)

Purpose: Basal duct-like recess (DR) sign serves as a specific marker of papillary craniopharyngiomas (PCPs) of the strictly third-ventricular (3 V) topography. Origins of this sign are poorly understood with limited validation in external cohorts., Methods: In this retrospective study, MRIs of pathologically proven PCPs were reviewed and evaluated for tumor topography, DR sign prevalence, and morphological subtypes., Results: Twenty-three cases with 24 MRIs satisfied our inclusion criteria. Median age was 44.5 years with a predominant male distribution (M/F ratio 4.7:1). Overall, strictly 3 V was the commonest tumor topography (8/24, 33.3%), and tumors were most commonly solid-cystic (10/24, 41.7%). The prevalence of DR sign was 21.7% (5/23 cases), all with strictly 3 V topography and with a predominantly solid consistency. The sensitivity, specificity and positive and negative predictive value of the DR sign for strict 3 V topography was 62.5%, 100%, 100% and 84.2% respectively. New pertinent findings associated with the DR sign were observed in our cohort. This included development of the cleft-like variant of DR sign after a 9-year follow-up initially absent at baseline imaging. Additionally, cystic dilatation of the basal tumor cleft at the pituitary stalk-tumor junction and presence of a vascular structure overlapping the DR sign were noted. Relevant mechanisms, hypotheses, and implications were explored., Conclusion: We confirm the DR sign as a highly specific marker of the strictly 3 V topography in PCPs. While embryological and molecular factors remain pertinent in understanding origins of the DR sign, non-embryological mechanisms may play a role in development of the cleft-like variant., (© 2024. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature.)

Inter-reader reliability of a new scoring system for evaluating joint inflammation and enthesitis in whole body MRI (WBMRI) in juvenile idiopathic arthritis was tested. The scoring system grades 732 item-region combinations of bone marrow and soft tissue changes for commonly involved joints and entheseal sites. Five radiologists rated 17 WBMRI scans through an online rating platform. Item-wise reliability was calculated for 117 items with non-zero scores in >10 % of readings. Interquartile ranges of the five-reader Kappa reliability coefficients were 0.58-0.73 (range: 0.36-0.88) for the joints, 0.65-0.81 (range: 0.39-0.95) for the entheses, and 0.62-0.75 (range: 0.60-0.76) for chronic nonbacterial osteomyelitis-like lesions., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest Dr. Andrea Doria has had the following relationships unrelated to the conduct of this study: Chair and Co-Chair of the International Myositis Assessment & Clinical Studies Group (not for profit) and the OMERACT SIG in MRI in JIA (not for profit), respectively, board member of the OMERACT Technical Advisory Group (not for profit), and PI of research grants from Novo Nordisk, the Terry Fox Foundation, the PSI Foundation, the Society of Pediatric Radiology, and the Garron Family Cancer Centre. Drs. Jonathan Akikusa and Marion van Rossum are also Co-Chairs of OMERACT SIG in MRI in JIA (not for profit). The remaining authors did not express any conflicts of interest related to current study., (Copyright © 2024. Published by Elsevier Inc.)

Background: Detection of pulmonary perfusion defects is the recommended approach for diagnosing chronic thromboembolic pulmonary hypertension (CTEPH). This is currently achieved in a clinical setting using scintigraphy. Phase-resolved functional lung (PREFUL) magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is an alternative technique for evaluating regional ventilation and perfusion without the use of ionizing radiation or contrast media., Purpose: To assess the feasibility and image quality of PREFUL-MRI in a multicenter setting in suspected CTEPH., Study Type: This is a prospective cohort sub-study., Population: Forty-five patients (64 ± 16 years old) with suspected CTEPH from nine study centers., Field Strength/sequence: 1.5 T and 3 T/2D spoiled gradient echo/bSSFP/T2 HASTE/3D MR angiography (TWIST)., Assessment: Lung signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) and contrast-to-noise ratio (CNR) were compared between study centers with different MRI machines. The contrast between normally and poorly perfused lung areas was examined on PREFUL images. The perfusion defect percentage calculated using PREFUL-MRI (QDP PREFUL ) was compared to QDP from the established dynamic contrast-enhanced MRI technique (QDP DCE ). Furthermore, QDP PREFUL was compared between a patient subgroup with confirmed CTEPH or chronic thromboembolic disease (CTED) to other clinical subgroups., Statistical Tests: t-Test, one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA), Pearson's correlation. Significance level was 5%., Results: Significant differences in lung SNR and CNR were present between study centers. However, PREFUL perfusion images showed a significant contrast between normally and poorly perfused lung areas (mean delta of normalized perfusion -4.2% SD 3.3) with no differences between study sites (ANOVA: P = 0.065). QDP PREFUL was significantly correlated with QDP DCE (r = 0.66), and was significantly higher in 18 patients with confirmed CTEPH or CTED (57.9 ± 12.2%) compared to subgroups with other causes of PH or with excluded PH (in total 27 patients with mean ± SD QDP PREFUL  = 33.9 ± 17.2%)., Data Conclusion: PREFUL-MRI could be considered as a non-invasive method for imaging regional lung perfusion in multicenter studies., Level of Evidence: 3 TECHNICAL EFFICACY: Stage 1., (© 2023 The Authors. Journal of Magnetic Resonance Imaging published by Wiley Periodicals LLC on behalf of International Society for Magnetic Resonance in Medicine.)

This study aimed to investigate the clinical stratification of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) patients in relation to in vivo cerebral degeneration. One hundred forty-nine ALS patients and one hundred forty-four healthy controls (HCs) were recruited from the Canadian ALS Neuroimaging Consortium (CALSNIC). Texture analysis was performed on T1-weighted scans to extract the texture feature "autocorrelation" (autoc), an imaging biomarker of cerebral degeneration. Patients were stratified at baseline into early and advanced disease stages based on criteria adapted from ALS clinical trials and the King's College staging system, as well as into slow and fast progressors (disease progression rates, DPR). Patients had increased autoc in the internal capsule. These changes extended beyond the internal capsule in early-stage patients (clinical trial-based criteria), fast progressors, and in advanced-stage patients (King's staging criteria). Longitudinal increases in autoc were observed in the postcentral gyrus, corticospinal tract, posterior cingulate cortex, and putamen; whereas decreases were observed in corpus callosum, caudate, central opercular cortex, and frontotemporal areas. Both longitudinal increases and decreases of autoc were observed in non-overlapping regions within insula and precentral gyrus. Within-criteria comparisons of autoc revealed more pronounced changes at baseline and longitudinally in early- (clinical trial-based criteria) and advanced-stage (King's staging criteria) patients and fast progressors. In summary, comparative patterns of baseline and longitudinal progression in cerebral degeneration are dependent on sub-group selection criteria, with clinical trial-based stratification insufficiently characterizing disease stage based on pathological cerebral burden., (© 2024. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany.)

Importance: In the last 25 years, functional magnetic resonance imaging drug cue reactivity (FDCR) studies have characterized some core aspects in the neurobiology of drug addiction. However, no FDCR-derived biomarkers have been approved for treatment development or clinical adoption. Traversing this translational gap requires a systematic assessment of the FDCR literature evidence, its heterogeneity, and an evaluation of possible clinical uses of FDCR-derived biomarkers., Objective: To summarize the state of the field of FDCR, assess their potential for biomarker development, and outline a clear process for biomarker qualification to guide future research and validation efforts., Evidence Review: The PubMed and Medline databases were searched for every original FDCR investigation published from database inception until December 2022. Collected data covered study design, participant characteristics, FDCR task design, and whether each study provided evidence that might potentially help develop susceptibility, diagnostic, response, prognostic, predictive, or severity biomarkers for 1 or more addictive disorders., Findings: There were 415 FDCR studies published between 1998 and 2022. Most focused on nicotine (122 [29.6%]), alcohol (120 [29.2%]), or cocaine (46 [11.1%]), and most used visual cues (354 [85.3%]). Together, these studies recruited 19 311 participants, including 13 812 individuals with past or current substance use disorders. Most studies could potentially support biomarker development, including diagnostic (143 [32.7%]), treatment response (141 [32.3%]), severity (84 [19.2%]), prognostic (30 [6.9%]), predictive (25 [5.7%]), monitoring (12 [2.7%]), and susceptibility (2 [0.5%]) biomarkers. A total of 155 interventional studies used FDCR, mostly to investigate pharmacological (67 [43.2%]) or cognitive/behavioral (51 [32.9%]) interventions; 141 studies used FDCR as a response measure, of which 125 (88.7%) reported significant interventional FDCR alterations; and 25 studies used FDCR as an intervention outcome predictor, with 24 (96%) finding significant associations between FDCR markers and treatment outcomes., Conclusions and Relevance: Based on this systematic review and the proposed biomarker development framework, there is a pathway for the development and regulatory qualification of FDCR-based biomarkers of addiction and recovery. Further validation could support the use of FDCR-derived measures, potentially accelerating treatment development and improving diagnostic, prognostic, and predictive clinical judgments.

Childhood experiences of low socioeconomic status are associated with alterations in neural function in the frontoparietal network and ventral visual stream, which may drive differences in working memory. However, the specific features of low socioeconomic status environments that contribute to these disparities remain poorly understood. Here, we examined experiences of cognitive deprivation (i.e. decreased variety and complexity of experience), as opposed to experiences of threat (i.e. violence exposure), as a potential mechanism through which family income contributes to alterations in neural activation during working memory. As part of a longitudinal study, 148 youth between aged 10 and 13 years completed a visuospatial working memory fMRI task. Early childhood low income, chronicity of low income in early childhood, and current income-to-needs were associated with task-related activation in the ventral visual stream and frontoparietal network. The association of family income with decreased activation in the lateral occipital cortex and intraparietal sulcus during working memory was mediated by experiences of cognitive deprivation. Surprisingly, however, family income and deprivation were not significantly related to working memory performance, and only deprivation was associated with academic achievement in this sample. Taken together, these findings suggest that early life low income and associated cognitive deprivation are important factors in neural function supporting working memory., (© The Author(s) 2024. Published by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail: journals.permission@oup.com.)

Since the early 1990s, there have literally been thousands of reports related to magnetic resonance imaging of the autistic brain. The goals of these studies have ranged from identifying the earliest biological predictors of an autistic diagnosis to determining brain systems most altered in autistic individuals. Some of the later works attempt to use distinct patterns of brain alterations to help define more homogenous subtypes of autism. Far less work has been done to identify brain changes that are associated with therapeutic interventions. In this chapter, we will touch on all of these efforts as they relate to the general topic of the usefulness of brain imaging as a biomarker of autism., (© 2024. The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.)

BOLD fMRI is widely applied in human neuroscience but is limited in its spatial specificity due to a cortical-depth-dependent venous bias. This reduces its localization specificity with respect to neuronal responses, a disadvantage for neuroscientific research. Here, we modified a submillimeter BOLD protocol to selectively reduce venous and tissue signal and increase cerebral blood volume weighting through a pulsed saturation scheme (dubbed Arterial Blood Contrast) at 7 T. Adding Arterial Blood Contrast on top of the existing BOLD contrast modulated the intracortical contrast. Isolating the Arterial Blood Contrast showed a response free of pial-surface bias. The results suggest that Arterial Blood Contrast can modulate the typical fMRI spatial specificity, with important applications in in-vivo neuroscience., (© 2023 The Authors. Human Brain Mapping published by Wiley Periodicals LLC.)

Objective: We outline our vision for a 14 Tesla MR system. This comprises a novel whole-body magnet design utilizing high temperature superconductor; a console and associated electronic equipment; an optimized radiofrequency coil setup for proton measurement in the brain, which also has a local shim capability; and a high-performance gradient set., Research Fields: The 14 Tesla system can be considered a 'mesocope': a device capable of measuring on biologically relevant scales. In neuroscience the increased spatial resolution will anatomically resolve all layers of the cortex, cerebellum, subcortical structures, and inner nuclei. Spectroscopic imaging will simultaneously measure excitatory and inhibitory activity, characterizing the excitation/inhibition balance of neural circuits. In medical research (including brain disorders) we will visualize fine-grained patterns of structural abnormalities and relate these changes to functional and molecular changes. The significantly increased spectral resolution will make it possible to detect (dynamic changes in) individual metabolites associated with pathological pathways including molecular interactions and dynamic disease processes., Conclusions: The 14 Tesla system will offer new perspectives in neuroscience and fundamental research. We anticipate that this initiative will usher in a new era of ultra-high-field MR., (© 2023. The Author(s).)

Laminar functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) holds the potential to study connectivity at the laminar level in humans. Here we analyze simultaneously recorded electroencephalography (EEG) and high-resolution fMRI data to investigate how EEG power modulations, induced by a task with an attentional component, relate to changes in fMRI laminar connectivity between and within brain regions in visual cortex. Our results indicate that our task-induced decrease in beta power relates to an increase in deep-to-deep layer coupling between regions and to an increase in deep/middle-to-superficial layer connectivity within brain regions. The attention-related alpha power decrease predominantly relates to reduced connectivity between deep and superficial layers within brain regions, since, unlike beta power, alpha power was found to be positively correlated to connectivity. We observed no strong relation between laminar connectivity and gamma band oscillations. These results indicate that especially beta band, and to a lesser extent, alpha band oscillations relate to laminar-specific fMRI connectivity. The differential effects for alpha and beta bands indicate that they relate to different feedback-related neural processes that are differentially expressed in intra-region laminar fMRI-based connectivity., (© The Author(s) 2022. Published by Oxford University Press.)

A multiband (MB) echo-planar imaging (EPI) sequence is compared to a multiband multiecho (MBME) EPI protocol to investigate differences in sensitivity for task functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) at 3 T. Multiecho sampling improves sensitivity in areas where single-echo-EPI suffers from dropouts. However, It requires in-plane acceleration to reduce the echo train length, limiting the slice acceleration factor and the temporal and spatial resolution Data were acquired for both protocols in two sessions 24 h apart using an adapted color-word interference Stroop task. Besides protocol comparison statistically, we performed test-retest reliability across sessions for different protocols and denoising methods. We evaluated the sensitivity of two different echo-combination strategies for MBME-EPI. We examined the performance of three different data denoising approaches: "Standard," "AROMA," and "FIX" for MB and MBME, and assessed whether a specific method is preferable. We consider using an appropriate autoregressive model order within the general linear model framework to correct TR differences between the protocols. The comparison between protocols and denoising methods showed at group level significantly higher mean z-scores and the number of active voxels for MBME in the motor, subcortical and medial frontal cortices. When comparing different echo combinations, our results suggest that a contrast-to-noise ratio weighted echo combination improves sensitivity in MBME compared to simple echo-summation. This study indicates that MBME can be a preferred protocol in task fMRI at spatial resolution (≥2 mm), primarily in medial prefrontal and subcortical areas., (© 2022 The Authors. Human Brain Mapping published by Wiley Periodicals LLC.)

Purpose: Two-dimensional (2D) fast spin echo (FSE) techniques play a central role in the clinical magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) of knee joints. Moreover, three-dimensional (3D) FSE provides high-isotropic-resolution magnetic resonance (MR) images of knee joints, but it has a reduced signal-to-noise ratio compared to 2D FSE. Deep-learning denoising methods are a promising approach for denoising MR images, but they are often trained using synthetic noise due to challenges in obtaining true noise distributions for MR images. In this study, inherent true noise information from two number of excitations (2-NEX) acquisition was used to develop a deep-learning model based on residual learning of convolutional neural network (CNN), and this model was used to suppress the noise in 3D FSE MR images of knee joints., Methods: A deep learning-based denoising method was developed. The proposed CNN used two-step residual learning over parallel transporting and residual blocks and was designed to comprehensively learn real noise features from 2-NEX training data., Results: The results of an ablation study validated the network design. The new method achieved improved denoising performance of 3D FSE knee MR images compared with current state-of-the-art methods, based on the peak signal-to-noise ratio and structural similarity index measure. The improved image quality after denoising using the new method was verified by radiological evaluation., Conclusion: A deep CNN using the inherent spatial-varying noise information in 2-NEX acquisitions was developed. This method showed promise for clinical MRI assessments of the knee, and has potential applications for the assessment of other anatomical structures., (Copyright © 2022 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Quantitative imaging biomarkers (QIBs) can be defined as objective measures that are sensitive and specific to changes in tissue physiology. Provided the acquired QIBs are not affected by scanner changes, they could play an important role in disease diagnosis, prognosis, management, and treatment monitoring. The precision of selected QIBs was assessed from data collected on a 3-T scanner in four healthy participants over a 5-year period. Inevitable scanner changes and acquisition protocol revisions occurred during this time. Standard and custom processing pipelines were used to calculate regional brain volume, cortical thickness, T2, T2*, quantitative susceptibility, cerebral blood flow, axial, radial and mean diffusivity, peak width of skeletonized mean diffusivity, and fractional anisotropy from the acquired images. Coefficient of variation (CoV) and intra-class correlation (ICC) indices were determined in the short-term (i.e., repeatable over three acquisitions within 4 weeks) and in the long-term (i.e., reproducible over four acquisition sessions in 5 years). Precision indices varied based on acquisition technique, processing pipeline, and anatomical region. Good repeatability (average CoV=2.40% and ICC=0.78) and reproducibility (average CoV=8.86 % and ICC=0.72) were found over all QIBs. The best performance indices were obtained for diffusion derived biomarkers (CoV∼0.96% and ICCs=0.87); conversely, the poorest indices were found for the cerebral blood flow biomarker (CoV>10% and ICC<0.5). These results demonstrate that changes in protocol, along with hardware and software upgrades, did not affect the estimates of the selected biomarkers and their precision. Further characterization of the QIB is necessary to understand meaningful changes in the biomarkers in longitudinal studies of normal brain aging and translation to clinical research., Competing Interests: Conflict of Interest The authors have no conflict of interest., (Copyright © 2022. Published by Elsevier Inc.)

The trigeminal nerve is the fifth cranial nerve and is a sensory-motor nerve that provides the innervation to the face with its three roots. The trigeminal nerve can be affected by several diseases, such as vascular conflict, congenital malformation, inflammatory or neoplastic diseases. Magnetic Resonance Imaging plays a crucial role in its evaluation. This article aims to review the trigeminal nerve anatomy, discuss the best magnetic resonance imaging techniques to evaluate each nerve segment, and demonstrate the imaging aspect of the diseases that most commonly affect it., (Copyright © 2022 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Interactions between the amygdala and prefrontal cortex are fundamental to human emotion. Despite the central role of frontoamygdala communication in adult emotional learning and regulation, little is known about how top-down control emerges during human development. In the present cross-sectional pilot study, we experimentally manipulated prefrontal engagement to test its effects on the amygdala during development. Inducing dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (dACC) activation resulted in developmentally-opposite effects on amygdala reactivity during childhood versus adolescence, such that dACC activation was followed by increased amygdala reactivity in childhood but reduced amygdala reactivity in adolescence. Bayesian network analyses revealed an age-related switch between childhood and adolescence in the nature of amygdala connectivity with the dACC and ventromedial PFC (vmPFC). Whereas adolescence was marked by information flow from dACC and vmPFC to amygdala (consistent with that observed in adults), the reverse information flow, from the amygdala to dACC and vmPFC, was dominant in childhood. The age-related switch in information flow suggests a potential shift from bottom-up co-excitatory to top-down regulatory frontoamygdala connectivity and may indicate a profound change in the circuitry supporting maturation of emotional behavior. These findings provide novel insight into the developmental construction of amygdala-cortical connections and implications for the ways in which childhood experiences may influence subsequent prefrontal function., (© 2022 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.)

The amygdala and its connections with medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) play central roles in the development of emotional processes. While several studies have suggested that this circuitry exhibits functional changes across the first two decades of life, findings have been mixed - perhaps resulting from differences in analytic choices across studies. Here we used multiverse analyses to examine the robustness of task-based amygdala-mPFC function findings to analytic choices within the context of an accelerated longitudinal design (4-22 years-old; N = 98; 183 scans; 1-3 scans/participant). Participants recruited from the greater Los Angeles area completed an event-related emotional face (fear, neutral) task. Parallel analyses varying in preprocessing and modeling choices found that age-related change estimates for amygdala reactivity were more robust than task-evoked amygdala-mPFC functional connectivity to varied analytical choices. Specification curves indicated evidence for age-related decreases in amygdala reactivity to faces, though within-participant changes in amygdala reactivity could not be differentiated from between-participant differences. In contrast, amygdala-mPFC functional connectivity results varied across methods much more, and evidence for age-related change in amygdala-mPFC connectivity was not consistent. Generalized psychophysiological interaction (gPPI) measurements of connectivity were especially sensitive to whether a deconvolution step was applied. Our findings demonstrate the importance of assessing the robustness of findings to analysis choices, although the age-related changes in our current work cannot be overinterpreted given low test-retest reliability. Together, these findings highlight both the challenges in estimating developmental change in longitudinal cohorts and the value of multiverse approaches in developmental neuroimaging for assessing robustness of results., (© 2022 The Authors. Human Brain Mapping published by Wiley Periodicals LLC.)

Arterial spin labeled (ASL) magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is the primary method for noninvasively measuring regional brain perfusion in humans. We introduce ASLPrep, a suite of software pipelines that ensure the reproducible and generalizable processing of ASL MRI data., (© 2022. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature America, Inc.)

Objective: To develop a phantom system which can be integrated with an automated injection system, eliminating the experimental variability that arises with manual injection; for the purposes of pulse sequence testing and metric derivation in hyperpolarised 13 C-MR., Methods: The custom dynamic phantom was machined from Ultem and filled with a nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide and lactate dehydrogenase mixture dissolved in phosphate buffered saline. Hyperpolarised [1- 13 C]-pyruvate was then injected into the phantom ( n = 8) via an automated syringe pump and the conversion of pyruvate to lactate monitored through a 13 C imaging sequence., Results: The phantom showed low coefficient of variation for the lactate to pyruvate peak signal heights (11.6%) and dynamic area-under curve ratios (11.0%). The variance for the lactate dehydrogenase enzyme rate constant (kP) was also seen to be low at 15.6%., Conclusion: The dynamic phantom demonstrates high reproducibility for quantification of 13 C-hyperpolarised MR-derived metrics. Establishing such a phantom is needed to facilitate development of hyperpolarsed 13 C-MR pulse sequenced; and moreover, to enable multisite hyperpolarised 13 C-MR clinical trials where assessment of metric variability across sites is critical., Advances in Knowledge: The dynamic phantom developed during the course of this study will be a useful tool in testing new pulse sequences and standardisation in future hyperpolarised work.

Novel unimolecular bivalent glycoconjugates were assembled combining several functionalized capsular polysaccharides of Streptococcus pneumoniae and Neisseria meningitidis to a carrier protein by using an effective strategy based on the Ugi 4-component reaction. The development of multivalent glycoconjugates opens new opportunities in the field of vaccine design, but their high structural complexity involves new analytical challenges. Nuclear Magnetic Resonance has found wide applications in the characterization and impurity profiling of carbohydrate-based vaccines. Eight bivalent conjugates were studied by quantitative NMR analyzing the structural identity, the content of each capsular polysaccharide, the ratios between polysaccharides, the polysaccharide to protein ratios and undesirable contaminants. The qNMR technique involves experiments with several modified parameters for obtaining spectra with quantifiable signals. In addition, the achieved NMR results were combined with the results of colorimetric assay and Size Exclusion HPLC for assessing the protein content and free protein percentage, respectively. The application of quantitative NMR showed to be efficient to clear up the new structural complexities while allowing the quantitative assessment of the components., (Copyright © 2022 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

Cue reactivity is one of the most frequently used paradigms in functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) studies of substance use disorders (SUDs). Although there have been promising results elucidating the neurocognitive mechanisms of SUDs and SUD treatments, the interpretability and reproducibility of these studies is limited by incomplete reporting of participants' characteristics, task design, craving assessment, scanning preparation and analysis decisions in fMRI drug cue reactivity (FDCR) experiments. This hampers clinical translation, not least because systematic review and meta-analysis of published work are difficult. This consensus paper and Delphi study aims to outline the important methodological aspects of FDCR research, present structured recommendations for more comprehensive methods reporting and review the FDCR literature to assess the reporting of items that are deemed important. Forty-five FDCR scientists from around the world participated in this study. First, an initial checklist of items deemed important in FDCR studies was developed by several members of the Enhanced NeuroImaging Genetics through Meta-Analyses (ENIGMA) Addiction working group on the basis of a systematic review. Using a modified Delphi consensus method, all experts were asked to comment on, revise or add items to the initial checklist, and then to rate the importance of each item in subsequent rounds. The reporting status of the items in the final checklist was investigated in 108 recently published FDCR studies identified through a systematic review. By the final round, 38 items reached the consensus threshold and were classified under seven major categories: 'Participants' Characteristics', 'General fMRI Information', 'General Task Information', 'Cue Information', 'Craving Assessment Inside Scanner', 'Craving Assessment Outside Scanner' and 'Pre- and Post-Scanning Considerations'. The review of the 108 FDCR papers revealed significant gaps in the reporting of the items considered important by the experts. For instance, whereas items in the 'General fMRI Information' category were reported in 90.5% of the reviewed papers, items in the 'Pre- and Post-Scanning Considerations' category were reported by only 44.7% of reviewed FDCR studies. Considering the notable and sometimes unexpected gaps in the reporting of items deemed to be important by experts in any FDCR study, the protocols could benefit from the adoption of reporting standards. This checklist, a living document to be updated as the field and its methods advance, can help improve experimental design, reporting and the widespread understanding of the FDCR protocols. This checklist can also provide a sample for developing consensus statements for protocols in other areas of task-based fMRI., (© 2021. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Limited.)