• Clinical and Experimental Pediatrics
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• v.59 no.sup1
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• pp.32-36
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• 2016

Joubert syndrome (JS) is characterized by the "molar tooth sign" (MTS) with cerebellar vermis agenesis, episodic hyperpnea, abnormal eye movements, and hypotonia. Ocular and oculomotor abnormalities have been observed; however, Horner syndrome (HS) has not been documented in children with JS. We present the case of a 2-month-old boy having ocular abnormalities with bilateral nystagmus, left-dominant bilateral ptosis, and unilateral miosis and enophthalmos of the left eye, which were compatible with HS. Brain magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) revealed the presence of the MTS. Neck MRI showed no definite lesion or mass around the cervical sympathetic chain. His global development was delayed. He underwent ophthalmologic surgery, and showed some improvement in his ptosis. To the best of our knowledge, the association of HS with JS has not yet been described. We suggest that early neuroimaging should be considered for neonates or young infants with diverse eye abnormalities to evaluate the underlying etiology.

• Journal of Korean Neurosurgical Society
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• v.46 no.2
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• pp.161-164
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• 2009

Plasma cell granuloma is a tumor-like disease characterized by non-neoplastic polyclonal proliferation of plasma cells and other mononuclear cells. This disease occurs most frequently in the lung and upper respiratory tract, while the involvement of the central nervous system is very rare. A 44-year-old female patient presented with nausea and progressive visual disturbance. Brain magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) revealed the mass along the right tentorium with low signal intensity in the T2 weighted image (T2WI) and fluid-attenuated inversion recovery (FLAIR) sequence, and an isosignal intensity in T1 weighted image (T1WI), the latter of which was enhanced after administration of gadolinium-diethylenetriamine penta-acetic acid (Gd-DTPA). The thickest portion of the tentorium was partially excised via the combined suboccipital and infratentorial approach. The histopathological examination indicated a diagnosis of plasma cell granuloma. Postoperative steroid therapy was administered for remnant tumor control. Although a follow up MRI scan taken 20 months after the operation showed a slight decrease in tumor size, the lesion had extended to the falx and left frontal convexity along with parenchymal edema at 32 months after the operation and the clinical status was aggravated. The mass was removed from the left frontal convexity. Radiation therapy was given, together with steroid administration.

• KSII Transactions on Internet and Information Systems (TIIS)
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• v.12 no.9
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• pp.4336-4354
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• 2018

Fuzzy C-means (FCM) algorithm is a most usually technique for medical image segmentation. But conventional FCM fails to perform well enough on magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) data with the noise and intensity inhomogeneity (IIH). In the paper, we propose a Gamma correction conditional FCM algorithm with spatial information (GcsFCM) to solve this problem. Firstly, the pre-processing, Gamma correction, is introduced to enhance the details of images. Secondly, the spatial information is introduced to reduce the effect of noise. Then we introduce the effective neighborhood mechanism into the local space information to improve the robustness for the noise and inhomogeneity. And the mechanism describes the degree of participation in generating local membership values and building clusters. Finally, the adjustment mechanism and the spatial information are combined into the weighted membership function. Experimental results on four image volumes with noise and IIH indicate that the proposed GcsFCM algorithm is more effective and robust to noise and IIH than the FCM, sFCM and csFCM algorithms.

• Journal of Veterinary Clinics
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• v.34 no.2
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• pp.94-97
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• 2017

A 10-year-old male Schnauzer dog presented with a 1-week history of ataxia, right-sided hemiparesis, and right-sided head tilt. On the basis of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) with neurological examination and cerebrospinal fluid analysis results, a primary brain tumor was suspected. Therapy with imatinib mesylate plus hydroxyurea for 7 weeks was not effective and clinical signs worsened. Chemotherapy was then changed to lomustine plus hydroxyurea. Although the existing clinical signs continued, they did not deteriorate. No change in mass size was observed in subsequent MRI. The subject suddenly died from dyspnea 388 days after initial presentation. In this case, choroid plexus papilloma was definitively diagnosed based on histopathological findings.

• Journal of Korean Neurosurgical Society
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• v.54 no.6
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• pp.467-476
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• 2013

Objective : This study aimed to evaluate the hypotheses that administration routes [intra-arterial (IA) vs. intravenous (IV)] affect the early stage migration of transplanted human bone marrow-derived mesenchymal stem cells (hBM-MSCs) in acute brain infarction. Methods : Male Sprague-Dawley rats (n=40) were subjected to photothrombotic infarction. Three days after photothrombotic infarction, rats were randomly allocated to one of four experimental groups [IA group : n=12, IV group : n=12, superparamagnetic iron oxide (SPIO) group : n=8, control group : n=8]. All groups were subdivided into 1, 6, 24, and 48 hours groups according to time point of sacrifice. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) consisting of T2 weighted image (T2WI), $T2^*$ weighted image ($T2^*WI$), susceptibility weighted image (SWI), and diffusion weighted image of rat brain were obtained prior to and at 1, 6, 24, and 48 hours post-implantation. After final MRI, rats were sacrificed and grafted cells were analyzed in brain and lung specimen using Prussian blue and immunohistochemical staining. Results : Grafted cells appeared as dark signal intensity regions at the peri-lesional zone. In IA group, dark signals in peri-lesional zone were more prominent compared with IV group. SWI showed largest dark signal followed by $T2^*WI$ and T2WI in both IA and IV groups. On Prussian blue staining, IA administration showed substantially increased migration and a large number of transplanted hBM-MSCs in the target brain than IV administration. The Prussian blue-positive cells were not detected in SPIO and control groups. Conclusion : In a rat photothrombotic model of ischemic stroke, selective IA administration of human mesenchymal stem cells is more effective than IV administration. MRI and histological analyses revealed the time course of cell migration, and the numbers and distribution of hBM-MSCs delivered into the brain.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Radiology
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• v.14 no.5
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• pp.585-595
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• 2020

Magnetic resonance imaging(MRI) has become an important technique for examining changes in human brain structure with neurological disorders. Brain development is a very complex process, and is affected by neurogenesiss and genetic programs. As age increases, structures of the brain change, which can contribute to the formation of brain diseases. Among the various factors, Gender is one of the greatest influential factors that affect the development of a healthy brain. The images were analyzed through various programs found in FSL such as SIENAX, FIRST, and Vertex analysis. Our results show that significant gender-related differences in subcortical areas were observed at the particular age group. The magnitude of these differences between gender and volume varied depending on the area investigated. In this study, we used more advanced 3T MRI for the structural analysis of subcortical structures between each gender. In addition, Vertex Analysis was used to visualize the volumetric differences in subcortical structures between each gender. This study is limited to groups in their 70s, therefore, further studies are needed for wider age groups.

• Journal of Magnetics
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• v.17 no.2
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• pp.158-162
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• 2012

Although 3.0T magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) has the advantages of a higher signal to noise ratio (SNR) and contrast than 1.5T MRI, there are limitations on the contrast between white and grey matter because of the long T1 recovery time when T1 images are obtained using the Spin Echo Technique. To overcome this, T1 weighted images are obtained occasionally using the inversion recovery (IR) technique, which employs a relatively long TR. The aim of this study was to determine the optimal TI in a brain examination when a T1 weighted image is obtained using the IR technique. Eight participants (male: 7, female: 1, average age: $34{\pm}14.11$) with a normal diagnosis were targeted from February 18, 2012 to February 27, 2012, and the contrast between white and grey matter as well as the contrast to noise ratio (CNRs) in each participant were measured. The CNRs of white matter and grey matter were highest at TI = 600, 650, 750, 900, 1050 and 1100 ms when the TR was 1100, 1400, 1700, 2000, 2300 and 2600 ms, respectively. Therefore, as the TIs were $44.425{\pm}0.877%$ of the TRs in the TR range of 1400-2300 ms, the optimal T1 weighted images that describe the contrast between white and grey matter can be obtained if the TIs are compensated for with $44.425{\pm}0.877%$ of the TRs in the time of setting TIs.

• Journal of Veterinary Clinics
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• v.27 no.6
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• pp.755-759
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• 2010

A 6-year-old, intact female Dachshund was presented with generalized seizure for 2 days. Based on the neurologic and physical examinations, intracranial diseases were suspected. 1.5T and 7.0T magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) of the brain were taken. The MRI results revealed diffuse hyperintense lesions in the area of the diencephalon to the medulla oblongata in the T2-weighted images. Canine distemper virus-induced meningoencephalitis was confirmed by the result of RT-PCR of the cerebrospinal fluid (CSF). The dog was euthanized 7 days after diagnosis due to poor prognosis and clinical deterioration. Postmortem histopathologic examination was consistent with the MRI findings. This is the first case report using 1.5T and 7.0T MRI to compare the virus-induced intracranial lesions in meningoencephalitis.

• Physical Therapy Korea
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• v.9 no.3
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• pp.67-76
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• 2002

We report the reorganization of motor network resulted from intensive unilateral coordination training and the effect of cross education on the untrained side in patient with traumatic brain injury using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). A 22 year-old male patient who had suffered from diffuse axonal injury for 58 months showed coordination deficit in the left hand at initial examination. Intensive motor training including complex finger movements and coordination activities using a metronome was introduced to the patient 4 hours per day for a week. FMRI was performed on a 3T ISOL Forte scanner. All functional images were analyzed using SPM-99 software. Hand function was improved after training not only in the trained left hand, but also in the untrained right hand. There was no activation in the right primary motor area (M1) during left hand movement before training whereas robust activation of left M1 was demonstrated by the right hand movement. Profuse activation of bilateral prefrontal lobes was seen during both hand movements before training. After training of left hand, right M1 became prominently activated during the left hand motion. The activation of bilateral prefrontal lobes disappeared after training not only for the left hand movement but also for the right, which clearly demonstrated the effect of cross education. This case report demonstrated the learning-dependent reorganization of the M1 and the effect of cross education.

• Journal of Korean Neurosurgical Society
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• v.45 no.4
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• pp.219-223
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• 2009

Objective : Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) is frequently used to localize language areas in a non-invasive manner. Various paradigms for presurgical localization of language areas have been developed, but a systematic quantitative evaluation of the efficiency of those paradigms has not been performed. In the present study, the authors analyzed different language paradigms to see which paradigm is most efficient in localizing frontal language areas. Methods : Five men and five women with no neurological deficits participated (mean age, 24 years) in this study. All volunteers were right-handed. Each subject performed 4 tasks, including fixation (Fix), sentence reading (SRI. pseudoword reading (PR), and word generation (WG). Fixation and pseudoword reading were used as contrasts. The functional area was defined as the area(s) with a t-value of more than 3.92 in fMRI with different tasks. To apply an anatomical constraint, we used a brain atlas mapping system, which is available in AFNI, to define the anatomical frontal language area. The numbers of voxels in overlapped area between anatomical and functional area were individually counted in the frontal expressive language area. Results : Of the various combinations, the word generation task was most effective in delineating the frontal expressive language area when fixation was used as a contrast (p<0.05). The sensitivity of this test for localizing Broca's area was 81 % and specificity was 70%. Conclusion : Word generation versus fixation could effectively and reliably delineate the frontal language area. A customized effective paradigm should be analyzed in order to evaluate various language functions.