Patent Abstract:
the invention relates to novel imaging - based biomarkers for characterizing the structure or function of a human or animal brain . these biomarkers can be a weighted confluency sum score or a percent shielding by brain lesions . methods implementing these biomarkers are also disclosed .

Detailed Description:
fig1 a shows a transversal slice of a flair - mr image without delineation of subcortical hyperintensities . such transversal slices are known from prior art . fig1 b shows a transversal slice of a flair - mr image with delineation of subcortical hyperintensities . in this figure , a large confluent lesion can be well distinguished from a small spherical lesion . a delineation as shown in fig1 b is used in a method according to the first exemplary embodiment explained in the following . fig2 a to 6 will be explained with respect to this first exemplary embodiment . fig7 a to 10 will be explained with respect to a second exemplary embodiment . first exemplary embodiment : calculation of a weighted confluency sum score ( wcss ) the exemplary embodiment relates to a ( computer ) system for fully automatic determination of a weighted confluency sum score ( wcss ). this system utilizes magnetic resonance ( mr ) image data of the human brain . it starts with the automatic detection of all brain lesions in the mr image and accurate delineation of their outer contours . an exemplary result is shown in fig1 b . the system implements an algorithm for automatic detection of flair - hyperintense white - matter lesions which has been proposed by schmidt and co - workers for application in with multiple sclerosis [ 3 ]. this schmidt algorithm generates a three - dimensional hyperintensity map which is then binarized . the binarized hyperintensity map is then clustered into separate hyperintensity lesions using the routine spm_bwlabel from the statistical parametric software package ( version spm8 , http :// www . fil . ion . ucl . ac . uk / spm /). this routine labels connected components on the basis of a connectivity criterion to be specified . six adjacent voxels ( on the surface ) have been defined here as connectivity criterion . then the system computes the confluency for each brain lesion according to formula ( ii ) surface and volume of the hyperintensity lesion are computed by counting of voxels as defined in the clustered hyperintensity map . this is computationally very efficient . the weighting factor w i for a given hyperintensity lesion is defined according to its localization within the brain : w i = 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 if the lesion is located within periventricular white matter , deep white / grey matter , subcortical white matter , or within the brain stem , respectively . the assignment of the lesion to these four different regions is based on an anatomical map that has been previously created from tissue probability maps provided by spm8 . this anatomical map is depicted in fig2 a , wherein subcortical white matter is depicted in dark red , deep white / grey matter is depicted in green , periventricular white matter is depicted in orange and brainstem is depicted in blue . for a better anatomical orientation , fig2 b shows corresponding slices from a t1 - weighted mr image . if a hyperintensity lesion is located in more than one of the regions , it is assigned the highest weighting factor of these lesions . finally , the weighted confluency sum score ( wcss ) is computed according to formula ( v ) the individual parameters have the same meaning as in case of formula ( i ). the only difference between formula ( i ) and ( v ) is that in case of formula ( v ) m is used as number of the analyzed brain lesions . thereby , m refers to the total number of hyperintensity lesions in the hyperintensity map consisting of at least 100 voxels . the instantly described system has been successfully validated by the following experiments : the algorithm proposed by schmidt and co - workers for flair - hyperintensity lesions in multiple sclerosis was successfully validated in 44 elderly patients ( mean age 80 years ) with unclear cognitive impairment from several wards for geriatric inpatients . as already explained above , there is no perfect sphere in mr images , but only ‘ edgy ’ approximations of a sphere composed of cubic voxels . computer simulations of spheres composed of a varying number of cubic voxels showed that the resulting error in the confluency can be neglected for spheres composed of at least 100 voxels . the according results are shown in fig3 . for spheres composed of at least 100 voxels , the confluency approaches zero , i . e . the value of an ideal sphere . computer simulations were performed to show that the confluency according to formula ( ii ) indeed is a useful measure of confluency of brain lesions . specifically , 6 spherical lesions of 10 mm radius each and one cuboid simulating the confluency of the 6 spheres to one single contiguous lesion were analyzed . the results are depicted in fig4 a and 4b . the calculated wcss was almost zero for the pattern consisting of the 6 spherical lesions , whereas it was only 0 . 74 for the cuboid ( all weighting factors were set to 1 ). when the number of spherical lesions that confluenced to a cuboid was increased , the wcss of the cuboid showed a continuous increase . the according results can be seen in fig5 showing that the confluency score of a cuboid increases continuously with its length , i . e . the number of spherical lesions that confluenced to the cuboid . the wcss of the pattern of spherical lesions remained almost zero , independent on the number of spherical lesions ( all weighting factors were set to 1 ). in a clinical evaluation , the area under a receiver - operating characteristic curve for differentiation between patients with vascular cognitive decline and patients without relevant cerebrovascular disease by the wcss was 0 . 830 . this is shown in fig6 . this clearly shows that the wcss is clinically useful . second exemplary embodiment : calculation of a percent shielding by white matter hyperintensities ( sbwmh ) patho - physiological changes in the brain caused by neurodegenerative diseases such as alzheimer &# 39 ; s disease include alterations of brain activity ( synaptic dysfunction ). positron emission tomography of the brain with the glucose analog f - 18 - fluorodeoxyglucose ( fdg pet ) provides biomarkers for ( synaptic ) function and dysfunction , as depicted in fig7 a and 7b . fig7 a shows fdg pet images of the brain in a patient with alzheimer &# 39 ; s disease . these images show a reduction of brain activity compared to a healthy subject ( cf . fig7 b ) in most brain regions except visual and motor cortex , subcortical brain structures and the cerebellum . the reduction is most pronounced in posterior cingulum / precuneus area and the parietotemporal cortex ( indicated by arrows ). this pattern is typical for alzheimer &# 39 ; s disease . the reduction of brain activity is mainly caused by reduced synaptic activity . although there is some loss of brain tissue ( atrophy ) in alzheimer &# 39 ; s disease , its impact on brain fdg pet is rather small , at least at early stages of the disease . in case of strong atrophy , the effect on fdg pet can be taken into account by partial volume correction . in old patients , however , the detection of synaptic dysfunction associated with neurodegenerative disease is complicated by the high rate of vascular co - morbidity , for example infarcts of the brain of varying size . this is depicted in fig8 a and 8b . fig8 a shows brain fdg pet images in a patient who was suspected to have alzheimer &# 39 ; s disease . the pattern of reduction in the pet indeed looks rather similar to the typical pattern in alzheimer &# 39 ; s disease ( cf . fig7 a ). however , inspection of the mri of the same patient ( depicted in fig8 b ) reveals several infarcts and strong white matter disease ( indicated by arrows ). this vascular pathology fully explains the abnormal findings in the fdg pet . therefore , there is no indication of alzheimer &# 39 ; s disease in this patient . the patient has vascular cognitive decline . it is evident that there is no fdg uptake in infarcted tissue ( scar ). whether or not a reduction of fdg uptake is the direct consequence of an infarct can be tested rather easily by coregistering t1 - and / or t2 - weigthed mri ( in which most infarcts are clearly displayed ) to the fdg pet . however , not only infarcts but also impairment of axonal connections can cause reduced synaptic activity in both neighboring and distant grey matter regions , due to interruption of axonal tracts to this region . since white matter hyperintensities are to be considered as specific brain lesions , the novel biomarker sbwmh is an embodiment of the biomarker sbbl ( shielding by brain lesions ). it is a marker of impairment of axonal connections in form of a percent shielding of cortical brain regions by white matter hyperintensities . a processing pipeline for fully automated computation and display of sbwmh has been implemented as a matlab script . for some processing steps , tools from the statistical parametric mapping software package are used ( version spm8 ). the pipeline comprises the following steps . the “ lesion segmentation toolbox ”, a freely - available add - on to spm8 , is used to extract wmhs from the patient &# 39 ; s structural mri . the toolbox requires a high - resolution t1 - weighted mri and a flair - mri as input . the output is a binary lesion map delineating wmhs in the patient &# 39 ; s native space . spm &# 39 ; s co - register tool is used to register the lesion map with the fdg pet . spm &# 39 ; s normalize tool is used to transform co - registered images into the anatomical space of the montreal neurological institute ( mni ). a ( homoscedastic ) t - test for two independent samples is used to compare the patient &# 39 ; s normalized fdg pet to the normalized fdg pets of a database of aged - matched healthy controls . the global fdg - uptake is used as reference value for intensity scaling prior to the statistical test . reduced scaled fdg - uptake is defined as “ hypometabolism ” if p ≦ 0 . 001 . this results in a parametric map of hypometabolism . such a hypometabolism map is shown in fig9 a depicting a parametric hypometabolism map ( blue blobs ) overlaid to the patient &# 39 ; s fdg - pet . the sbwmh is computed for each hypometabolic voxel as the fraction of neighboring white matter voxels affected by wmh ( fig1 ). the 50 ml white matter voxels closest to the hypometabolic voxel are used as white matter “ neighborhood ”. white matter is defined by a binary mask that has been generated from the a priori tissue probability maps used for wmh lesion segmentation . the sbwmh values are saved to a 3 - dimensional parametric map . the slover tool as implemented in spm8 is used to display the sbwmh map ( as “ blobs ” with “ jet ” colortable ) together with the wmh lesion mask ( as contours ) superimposed to the patient &# 39 ; s fdg pet in mni space . an according map is shown in fig9 b depicting a parametric sbwmh map ( jet - colored blobs ) and wmh lesion map ( red contours ) overlaid to the fdg pet . the sbwmh values are quantitative : sbwmh = 50 means that as much as 50 % of the closest 50 ml white matter voxels are affected by wmh . as a consequence , the hypometabolism in this voxel most likely is caused by neighboring wmh , i . e . the hypometabolism is due to cerebrovascular disease , whereas no indication of neurodegenerative disease could be found . in the example depicted in fig9 a and 9b , the hypometabolism in the left lateral frontal cortex , the left parietotemporal cortex and in the precuneus can be explained by wmh ( green arrows ). the hypometabolism in the medial frontal cortex most likely is not caused by wmh , it rather might be an unspecific effect of old age ( red arrow ). the patient most likely does not suffer from alzheimer &# 39 ; s disease ( ad ), although the pattern of hypometabolism is similar to the typical ad pattern . thus , in this case , the sbwmh map reduces the risk of misinterpretation the structural alterations of the brain as ad . the basic idea underlying the percent shielding by brain lesions is illustrated in fig1 . the percent shielding by brain lesions of a brain area a is computed as the percentage of image voxels or image pixels belonging to a brain lesion bl in a predefined volume or area b surrounding the considered brain area a . there can be more than one brain lesion bl in the volume or area b all of which contribute to the percent shielding of a . 1 . wardlaw , j . m ., et al ., neuroimaging standards for research into small vessel disease and its contribution to ageing and neurodegeneration . lancet neurol , 2013 . 12 ( 8 ): p . 822 - 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