Assessment of Traumatic Brain Injury in Infants Using Diffusional Kurtosis Imaging

School Name

Governor's School for Science & Mathematics

Grade Level

12th Grade

Presentation Topic

Physiology and Health

Presentation Type

Mentored

Mentor

Mentor: Donna Roberts, Medical University of South Carolina

Abstract

When trying to identify the internal damage that is caused by abusive head trauma, it is difficult to show the injuries that are created deep in the brain using a traditional MRI. Traditional MRI creates images that show the difference between the white and grey matter in the brain, but it is difficult to distinguish between damaged and non-damaged white matter by simply looking at the scans. An alternate technique, such as diffusional kurtosis imaging (DKI), can be used to further analyze such injuries in white matter tracts. The main focus of this research is to use DKI to identify internal damage in cases of abusive head trauma in infants. The focus is on the internal capsule in the brain. These DK images were then processed using MATLAB and mricron to differentiate between extreme and less severe cases using parameters, such as kmean (mean kurtosis), dmean (mean diffusivity), and AWF (axonal water fraction). These parameters focus on the diffusion of water in the brain as well as along the axons that make up the white matter. Results indicate that three out of the four severe and fatal cases had higher kmean and AWF values than the less severe cases. However, one of the fatal cases did not have the same high values as others, but it followed the set curve made by the values of the patients with less severe head trauma. Further research is necessary in order to determine the efficacy of DKI in infant head trauma.

Location

Wall 318

Start Date

3-25-2017 9:45 AM

Presentation Format

Oral and Written

Group Project

No

COinS
 
Mar 25th, 9:45 AM

Assessment of Traumatic Brain Injury in Infants Using Diffusional Kurtosis Imaging

Wall 318

When trying to identify the internal damage that is caused by abusive head trauma, it is difficult to show the injuries that are created deep in the brain using a traditional MRI. Traditional MRI creates images that show the difference between the white and grey matter in the brain, but it is difficult to distinguish between damaged and non-damaged white matter by simply looking at the scans. An alternate technique, such as diffusional kurtosis imaging (DKI), can be used to further analyze such injuries in white matter tracts. The main focus of this research is to use DKI to identify internal damage in cases of abusive head trauma in infants. The focus is on the internal capsule in the brain. These DK images were then processed using MATLAB and mricron to differentiate between extreme and less severe cases using parameters, such as kmean (mean kurtosis), dmean (mean diffusivity), and AWF (axonal water fraction). These parameters focus on the diffusion of water in the brain as well as along the axons that make up the white matter. Results indicate that three out of the four severe and fatal cases had higher kmean and AWF values than the less severe cases. However, one of the fatal cases did not have the same high values as others, but it followed the set curve made by the values of the patients with less severe head trauma. Further research is necessary in order to determine the efficacy of DKI in infant head trauma.