Deterministic Tractography of the Nigrostriatal-Nigropallidal Pathway in Parkinson’s Disease

We hypothesized that deterministic tractography is practical and sensitive to changes in the complex nigrostriatal and nigropallidal pathway (NSP) in Parkinson’s disease (PD). Using diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) tractography, we investigated the NSP to evaluate differences between PD patients and controls, and examined their clinico-radiologic correlation. Structural and DTI brain scans were obtained in 40 subjects (21 PD patients and 19 healthy controls). We isolated the NSP using a user-friendly DTI toolkit based on deterministic brute-force tractography. DTI parameters of fractional anisotropy (FA), mean, axial, and radial diffusivity, and streamline count of the NSP were measured. Average FA (p < 0.01) and streamline count (p < 0.001) were significantly lower in the PD compared to control group. Mean diffusivity and radial diffusivity were significantly higher in the PD group (p < 0.05). Average streamline count correlated with the United Parkinson’s Disease Rating Scale motor score (p < 0.05). Point-to-point FA profiles of the tract demonstrated peak divergence between PD and control towards the tract midpoint rather than the distal grey matter. Our findings demonstrated a clinically and radiologically practical application of DTI tractography to the NSP in PD, without requiring complex imaging sequences for anatomical localization or segmentation software.