Neurogenetics in the Pediatric Brain: A 1H MRS Study of Brain Development

Jack Knight-Scott¹, Sarah Andrea Wijtenburg¹

Understanding normal brain development is essential to all basic and clinical research on pediatric brain disorders. In this work, we examine neurochemistry in the pediatric brain using STEAM at 3-T. In general, we detect higher neurogenetic activity in the pediatric brain, with nine metabolites showing significant differences from the adult brain. Relative to the adult brain, phosphorylethanolamine and GABA showed the largest increase; however, the most striking difference was the elevation of the 1.63-ppm M4 macrocmolecule resonance in the adult brain.