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. 2012:2:826.
doi: 10.1038/srep00826. Epub 2012 Nov 9.

Multimodal imaging of human cerebellum - merging X-ray phase microtomography, magnetic resonance microscopy and histology

Georg Schulz  1 , Conny Waschkies, Franz Pfeiffer, Irene Zanette, Timm Weitkamp, Christian David, Bert Müller
Affiliations

Multimodal imaging of human cerebellum - merging X-ray phase microtomography, magnetic resonance microscopy and histology

Georg Schulz et al. Sci Rep. 2012.

Abstract

Imaging modalities including magnetic resonance imaging and X-ray computed tomography are established methods in daily clinical diagnosis of human brain. Clinical equipment does not provide sufficient spatial resolution to obtain morphological information on the cellular level, essential for applying minimally or non-invasive surgical interventions. Therefore, generic data with lateral sub-micrometer resolution have been generated from histological slices post mortem. Sub-cellular spatial resolution, lost in the third dimension as a result of sectioning, is obtained using magnetic resonance microscopy and micro computed tomography. We demonstrate that for human cerebellum grating-based X-ray phase tomography shows complementary contrast to magnetic resonance microscopy and histology. In this study, the contrast-to-noise values of magnetic resonance microscopy and phase tomography were comparable whereas the spatial resolution in phase tomography is an order of magnitude better. The registered data with their complementary information permit the distinct segmentation of tissues within the human cerebellum.

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Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1. Cerebellum block extraction.
The photograph (right) and MR-slice acquired using a Verio 3T whole body scanner (Siemens Health Care, Erlangen, Germany) illustrate the location and size of the cerebellum within the donated body.
Figure 2
Figure 2. X-ray phase micro computed tomography and MR microscopy of the cerebellum.
The selected orthogonal virtual cuts through the specimen and the corresponding histograms of the 3D data illustrate the power and complementary nature of the two techniques for imaging the human cerebellum.
Figure 3
Figure 3. Tissue contrast in human cerebellum.
The above data compare contrast values between µMRI and PC-µCT for white matter and stratum granulosum (A), white matter and stratum moleculare (B), white matter and tissue in contact with formalin (C), stratum granulosum and stratum moleculare (D), stratum granulosum and tissue in contact with formalin (E) and between stratum moleculare and tissue with formalin (F).
Figure 4
Figure 4. Segmentation by means of a joint histogram.
From the joint histogram of the phase tomography and MR microscopy data it is possible to distinctly segment the stratum granulosum, stratum moleculare, white matter, and brain tissue that was in direct contact with formalin for a longer period of time than other parts. The white arrows indicate the positions of the related line plots. The colours of the virtual cuts of PC-µCT and µMRI on the right side correspond to the colours assigned to the four peaks in the joint histogram.
Figure 5
Figure 5. Spatial resolution of histology, X-ray phase tomography, and MR microscopy.
Comparable line plots through selected slices demonstrate that the spatial resolution decreases from histology via PC-µCT to µMRI.
Figure 6
Figure 6. Multimodal imaging of the cerebellum.
The fusion of slices from PC-µCT, µMRI, and histology using the RGB channels directly visualizes the contributions from the three imaging techniques. The combination of the three techniques permits the distinction of otherwise indistinguishable anatomical features, such as the separation between white matter (violet), stratum granulosum (yellow), stratum moleculare (green) and blood vessels of different sizes (purple and white arrows). The enlarged regions (with different magnification) show the light blue coloured small capillaries.
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