Detection & Mapping of Delays in Early Cortical Folding in Fetuses with Ventriculomegaly from In Utero MRI

Piotr A. Habas¹, Julia A. Scott¹, Vidya Rajagopalan¹, Kio Kim¹, A. James Barkovich¹, Orit A. Glenn¹, Colin Studholme¹

We present the results of spatially unconstrained detection and mapping of folding delays in fetuses with IMVM. MR imaging was performed for 16 IMVM subjects at 22.00-25.43GW and 22 age-matched controls. For each subject, a motion-corrected 3D MRI was reconstructed from multiple stacks of SSFSE T2w slices. Temporal changes in local curvature of the inner cortical surface were represented using a general linear model with a delay term for IMVM subjects. Significant folding delays were detected bilaterally along the parieto-occipital sulcus of IMVM subjects. Analysis with older fetuses will determine whether these differences are transient or persist into later gestation.