Christoph Leuze: “MRI evaluation of the CLARITY method for lipid removal from brain tissue”

September 15, 2015  13:00 〜 14:30

CiNet 1F Conference Room

Christoph Leuze

Department of Radiology, Stanford University/Stanford Neurosciences Institute

Host:  Hiromasa Takemura (Amano group)

Abstract:

Several different biological components such lipids, macromolecules and iron are known to contribute to the various types of MRI contrast (e.g. T1, T2, T2*, proton density, diffusion, etc.), yet the relative contribution of different biological components to different types of contrast is not well-established. This lack of understanding regarding the sources of MRI contrast limits the interpretability of MRI and hinders the development of new MRI contrast mechanisms. In this presentation I will show how we determined the relative contribution of lipids and proteins to MRI contrast in the brain. To do this we removed lipids from brain tissue specimens but preserved the location of proteins in the tissue according to the CLARITY method. I will present measurements during different stages of tissue clearing and the effect of lipid removal on various types of tissue contrast and will discuss the contribution of different tissue components to MRI contrast.