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Myelin Water Imaging Demonstrates Lower Brain Myelination in Children and Adolescents With Poor Reading Ability

Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) provides a means to non-invasively investigate the neurological links with dyslexia, a learning disability that affects one’s ability to read. Most previous brain MRI studies of dyslexia and reading skill have used structural or diffusion imaging to reveal regional b...

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Autores principales: Beaulieu, Christian, Yip, Eugene, Low, Pauline B., Mädler, Burkhard, Lebel, Catherine A., Siegel, Linda, Mackay, Alex L., Laule, Cornelia
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Frontiers Media S.A. 2020
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7596275/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33192398
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fnhum.2020.568395
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author Beaulieu, Christian
Yip, Eugene
Low, Pauline B.
Mädler, Burkhard
Lebel, Catherine A.
Siegel, Linda
Mackay, Alex L.
Laule, Cornelia
author_facet Beaulieu, Christian
Yip, Eugene
Low, Pauline B.
Mädler, Burkhard
Lebel, Catherine A.
Siegel, Linda
Mackay, Alex L.
Laule, Cornelia
author_sort Beaulieu, Christian
collection PubMed
description Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) provides a means to non-invasively investigate the neurological links with dyslexia, a learning disability that affects one’s ability to read. Most previous brain MRI studies of dyslexia and reading skill have used structural or diffusion imaging to reveal regional brain abnormalities. However, volumetric and diffusion MRI lack specificity in their interpretation at the microstructural level. Myelin is a critical neural component for brain function and plasticity, and as such, deficits in myelin may impact reading ability. MRI can estimate myelin using myelin water fraction (MWF) imaging, which is based on evaluation of the proportion of short T2 myelin-associated water from multi-exponential T2 relaxation analysis, but has not yet been applied to the study of reading or dyslexia. In this study, MWF MRI, intelligence, and reading assessments were acquired in 20 participants aged 10–18 years with a wide range of reading ability to investigate the relationship between reading ability and myelination. Group comparisons showed markedly lower MWF by 16–69% in poor readers relative to good readers in the left and right thalamus, as well as the left posterior limb of the internal capsule, left/right anterior limb of the internal capsule, left/right centrum semiovale, and splenium of the corpus callosum. MWF over the entire group also correlated positively with three different reading scores in the bilateral thalamus as well as white matter, including the splenium of the corpus callosum, left posterior limb of the internal capsule, left anterior limb of the internal capsule, and left centrum semiovale. MWF imaging from T2 relaxation suggests that myelination, particularly in the bilateral thalamus, splenium, and left hemisphere white matter, plays a role in reading abilities. Myelin water imaging thus provides a potentially valuable in vivo imaging tool for the study of dyslexia and its remediation.
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spelling pubmed-75962752020-11-13 Myelin Water Imaging Demonstrates Lower Brain Myelination in Children and Adolescents With Poor Reading Ability Beaulieu, Christian Yip, Eugene Low, Pauline B. Mädler, Burkhard Lebel, Catherine A. Siegel, Linda Mackay, Alex L. Laule, Cornelia Front Hum Neurosci Human Neuroscience Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) provides a means to non-invasively investigate the neurological links with dyslexia, a learning disability that affects one’s ability to read. Most previous brain MRI studies of dyslexia and reading skill have used structural or diffusion imaging to reveal regional brain abnormalities. However, volumetric and diffusion MRI lack specificity in their interpretation at the microstructural level. Myelin is a critical neural component for brain function and plasticity, and as such, deficits in myelin may impact reading ability. MRI can estimate myelin using myelin water fraction (MWF) imaging, which is based on evaluation of the proportion of short T2 myelin-associated water from multi-exponential T2 relaxation analysis, but has not yet been applied to the study of reading or dyslexia. In this study, MWF MRI, intelligence, and reading assessments were acquired in 20 participants aged 10–18 years with a wide range of reading ability to investigate the relationship between reading ability and myelination. Group comparisons showed markedly lower MWF by 16–69% in poor readers relative to good readers in the left and right thalamus, as well as the left posterior limb of the internal capsule, left/right anterior limb of the internal capsule, left/right centrum semiovale, and splenium of the corpus callosum. MWF over the entire group also correlated positively with three different reading scores in the bilateral thalamus as well as white matter, including the splenium of the corpus callosum, left posterior limb of the internal capsule, left anterior limb of the internal capsule, and left centrum semiovale. MWF imaging from T2 relaxation suggests that myelination, particularly in the bilateral thalamus, splenium, and left hemisphere white matter, plays a role in reading abilities. Myelin water imaging thus provides a potentially valuable in vivo imaging tool for the study of dyslexia and its remediation. Frontiers Media S.A. 2020-10-16 /pmc/articles/PMC7596275/ /pubmed/33192398 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fnhum.2020.568395 Text en Copyright © 2020 Beaulieu, Yip, Low, Mädler, Lebel, Siegel, Mackay and Laule. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
spellingShingle Human Neuroscience
Beaulieu, Christian
Yip, Eugene
Low, Pauline B.
Mädler, Burkhard
Lebel, Catherine A.
Siegel, Linda
Mackay, Alex L.
Laule, Cornelia
Myelin Water Imaging Demonstrates Lower Brain Myelination in Children and Adolescents With Poor Reading Ability
title Myelin Water Imaging Demonstrates Lower Brain Myelination in Children and Adolescents With Poor Reading Ability
title_full Myelin Water Imaging Demonstrates Lower Brain Myelination in Children and Adolescents With Poor Reading Ability
title_fullStr Myelin Water Imaging Demonstrates Lower Brain Myelination in Children and Adolescents With Poor Reading Ability
title_full_unstemmed Myelin Water Imaging Demonstrates Lower Brain Myelination in Children and Adolescents With Poor Reading Ability
title_short Myelin Water Imaging Demonstrates Lower Brain Myelination in Children and Adolescents With Poor Reading Ability
title_sort myelin water imaging demonstrates lower brain myelination in children and adolescents with poor reading ability
topic Human Neuroscience
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7596275/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33192398
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fnhum.2020.568395
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