Metabolic changes in the thalamus after spinal cord injury followed by proton MR spectroscopy

Abstract

Our study followed the changes in thalamic nuclei metabolism, hindlimb sensitivity to thermal stimulation, and locomotor function after spinal cord injury (SCI). MR spectroscopy (MRS) was used to examine the thalamic nuclei of rats 1 day before and 1, 3, 6, and 15 days after SCI or sham surgery. All animals were tested before MRS measurements for motor performance and thermal sensitivity. SCI induced by balloon compression caused complete paraplegia from the first to third day, followed by partial functional recovery during the second week. MRS revealed an increase in N-acetylaspartate (NAA) concentration in the thalamic nuclei on the first day after SCI, which decreased by the third day. The data also showed an increase in inositol (

Neuro magnetic resonance spectroscopy using wavelet decomposition and statistical testing identifies biochemical changes in people with spinal cord injury and pain

“…It was proposed that the decreased levels of NAA in these patients may be due to dysfunction of inhibitory neurons due to deafferentation, while the altered levels of mI may reflect differential alteration of glial cells (gliosis) in the thalami (Pattany et al, 2002). In the study undertaken by Likavcanova et al (2008), they also detected alterations in NAA and mI as well as change in glutamate in the acute phase (up to 6 days) following injury. They hypothesized that these changes were due to abnormalities in neurotransmission in the early phase after SCI resulting from death of motor neurons and/or sensory nerve excitability.…”

“…Spectroscopy studies of pain following SCI in humans (Pattany et al, 2002) and in animals (Likavcanova et al, 2008) have reported changes in cerebral metabolites. In the study undertaken by Pattany et al (2002), in vivo spectroscopy detected changes in thalamic biochemistry following SCI.…”

“…Similarly neurophysiological and neuroimaging studies in animal models of experimentally induced SCI have revealed alterations in neuronal firing (Gerke et al, 2003), thalamic biochemistry (Likavcanova et al, 2008) and cortical reorganization (Ghosh et al, 2009). Human neuroimaging studies have identified alterations in neural activity by electroencephalography (EEG) (Herbert et al, 2007), cortical reorganization using fMRI (Turner et al, 2003;Wrigley et al, 2009), and cerebral biochemistry using brain spectroscopy (Puri et al, 1998) in the brains of patients following SCI.…”

Metabolic changes in the rat brain after a photochemical lesion treated by stem cell transplantation assessed by 1H MRS

“…Assuming that the change in the ratio is due to increased NAA in neurons, the authors associated the increase in the NAA/Cr ratio with neuronal adaptation to injury. Likavcanova et al [33] observed a significant increase in NAA concentration in the rat thalamus stem after spinal cord injury. They hypothesized that this could be due to edema developing in the lesion, where NAA, according to Baslow's suggestion [28,29], has a neuroprotective function against edema in neurons.…”

Spinal Cord Injury: How Can We Improve the Classification and Quantification of Its Severity and Prognosis?

“…Changes in the concentration of metabolites found within the anterior cingulate and the thalamus correlated with chronic neuropathic pain. [75][76] In an MRS study of subjects with CSM, the N-acetyl aspartate/choline (NAA/Cho) ratio was reduced indicating chronic neuronal loss and lactate peaks were found in several patients consistent with ongoing spinal cord ischemia. 77 In a subsequent study using proton MRS, the authors correlated the NAA/Cho ratio with reduced neurological function in CSM patients.…”