Validation of qMT and CEST MRI as Biomarkers of Response to Treatment After Lumbar Spinal Cord Injury in Rats

Spinal cord injuries (SCI) result in severe disruptions in motor, sensory, and autonomic function. Few treatments exist that successfully target these pathological changes after SCI, a situation exacerbated by the lack of non-invasive tools for longitudinal monitoring of recovery processes. The study uses noninvasive multiparametric magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) for assessing spinal cord tissues after injury and demonstrate how they may be used to evaluate the efficacy of SCI treatments over time. The researchers studied the effects of riluzole, an anti-glutamatergic neuroprotective drug that has been FDA-approved and is currently being studied in preclinical and clinical trials as a neuroprotective treatment for SCI.

• 1
  qMT PSR measurements reflect the myelination status of the white matter tissue. The riluzole treatment group indicated significantly higher PSR values in white matter voxels at the epicenter of injury compared to the HBC vehicle treatment group.
• 2
  CEST Z-spectra showed that the 3.5 ppm APT pool amplitude decreased significantly in the riluzole treatment group compared to the vehicle control group, indicating potentially reduced neuroinflammatory activity.
• 3
  All four behavioral tests detected recovery differences between the riluzole-treated and vehicle-treated rats with SCI. The riluzole treatment group showed significantly improved motor function recovery.