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Diffusion Tensor Imaging Increases Ability to Remove Benign Brain Tumours in Children NEW YORK -- December 7, 2009 -- A new study published in the Journal of Neurosurgery: Pediatrics finds that operative plans for removing juvenile pilocytic astrocytoma (JPA) tumours in the thalamus of the brain can be augmented with diffusion tensor imaging (DTI). The sensitivity of DTI imaging allows for the visualisation of nerve fibre bundles in the brain. This information can maximise the potential of completely removing the tumour while avoiding damage to the fibre bundles that are directly related to motor functions of the patient. “This study of 6 children with thalamic JPA showed that using advanced MRI technology can help identify distorted nerve fibre bundles around brain tumours,” said Jeffrey H. Wisoff, MD, New York University Langone Medical Center, New York. “This allows an otherwise inoperable tumour to be completely removed, which can hopefully lead to a cure.” Operating on patients with deep-seated tumours such as JPA, a benign tumour in the thalamus most frequently observed in children and young adults, remains a neurosurgical challenge. Conventional imaging techniques, such as structural magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), has been revolutionary in helping to reveal major anatomical features of the brain, primary gray matter which is made up of nerve cell bodies. DTI, a variation of MRI, can help identify white matter, or nerve fibre bundles, using specific radio-frequency and magnetic field pulses to track the movement of water molecules of the brain. In most brain tissue, water molecules diffuse in all different directions. But they tend to diffuse along the length of axons, whose coating of white, fatty myelin holds them in. Scientists can create pictures of axons by analyzing the direction of water diffusion. SOURCE: NYU Langone Medical Center E-mail this page to a friend or colleague! To print, use this version