Open Access Publication of the Month – Dr. Ezequiel Farrher (INM-4) et al.
10 September 2025
To encourage us all to broaden our horizons, each month the Central Library selects one open access publication from the JuSER publications portal to be featured in the newsletter of Forschungszentrum Jülich.
In the open access publication of the month for September 2025, Dr. Ezequiel Farrher, Prof. Dr N. Jon Shah, et al. write about how accurate mathematical modelling of the diffusion- and transverse-relaxation-weighted MRI signal can improve our understanding of the cascade of biophysical mechanisms that are triggered by the onset of ischaemic stroke in brain tissue.
Ischaemic stroke, caused by a blockage that cuts off blood supply, leads to ischaemic tissue – areas not sufficiently supplied with nutrients. This initiates a cascade of changes in brain tissue, including cellular swelling, axon beading, and microstructural disintegration. One of the primary non-invasive tools for studying these processes in vivo is diffusion MRI, which, through measurements of water diffusion, provides access to tissue structural properties at the mesoscopic length scale – well below image resolution.
In this study, the authors used computer simulations and MRI experiments to investigate an improved modelling and estimation approach for the MRI signal in the brain. This method was subsequently utilized to investigate the tissue microstructural properties in a rat model of ischaemic stroke. This approach enables a more accurate quantification of water molecular diffusion and proton transverse relaxation properties, not only within ischaemic tissue but also in healthy brain tissue. This new set of relaxation- and diffusion-related parameters has the potential to both deepen our understanding of the biophysical mechanisms triggered after stroke onset, as well as to support the monitoring of tissue evolution and the prediction of stroke outcome.
The open access publication entitled "On the use of multi-echo NODDI MRI with released intrinsic diffusivity for the assessment of tissue diffusion and relaxation properties in experimental ischaemic stroke" was published in the journal NeuroImage.
JuSER publications portal – On the use of multi-echo NODDI MRI with released intrinsic diffusivity for the assessment of tissue diffusion and relaxation properties in experimental ischaemic stroke
Forschungszentrum Jülich – Central Library (ZB) – Open Access