Daniel Kuo1, Joseph Schooler1,
Janet Goldenstein1, Sarmad Siddiqui1, Swetha Shanbhag1,
Jean-Baptiste Pialat1, Andrew Burghardt1, Sharmila
Majumdar1, Michael Ries2, Galateia Kazakia1,
Xiaojuan Li1
1Musculoskeletal Quantitative Imaging
Research (MQIR), Department of Radiology and Biomedical Imaging, University
of California, San Francisco, San Francisco, CA, United States; 2Department
of Orthopaedic Surgery, University of California, San Francisco, San
Francisco, CA, United States
Osteoarthritis
(OA) is a complex disease that affects both cartilage and bone. Bone marrow
edema-like lesions (BMEL) are important in studying OA, but knowledge about
them is limited. In this study, we take a multi-modality imaging approach,
examining MR T1 and T2 values of BMEL-associated cartilage plus structure
and composition of BMEL tissue using high resolution peripheral quantitative
computed tomography (HR-pQCT) imaging and Fourier transform infrared (FTIR)
spectroscopy. Our results indicate that regions of BMEL are associated with
more advanced cartilage degeneration and that there is a localized imbalance
in bone formation and mineralization specific to BMEL regions.