Els Fieremans1,2, Yves De Deene2,3, Jens H. Jensen1, Joseph A. Helpern1
1Department of Radiology, CBI, New York University School of Medicine, New York, NY, USA; 2Department of Electronics and Information Systems, MEDISIP, Ghent University-IBBT-IBiTech, Ghent, Belgium; 3Department of Radiotherapy and Nuclear Medicine, QMRI, Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium
The origin of the anisotropic diffusion weighted (DW) MR-signal observed in brain white matter (WM) is still not completely understood. In this study, Monte Carlo simulations of diffusion are presented in a geometry imitating the white matter. The effect of exchange between the intracellular and extracellular compartment on the DW MR signal has been evaluated. The results show that the diffusion kurtosis is a good probe for the presence of membranes and is sensitive to changes in permeability. Fitting the kurtosis could reveal new insights in the physiology of cells during pathological states.