In vivo assessment of nervous fiber distribution in the intervertebral disc

Author

Tien Tuan Dao ; Pouletaut, Philippe ; Charleux, Fabrice ; Tho, Marie-Christine Ho Ba

Author_Institution

Biomech. & Bioeng., Univ. of Technol. of Compiegne, Compiegne, France

fYear

2014

fDate

26-30 Aug. 2014

Firstpage

2364

Lastpage

2367

Abstract

This present study aims to assess in vivo the nervous fibers distribution in the intervertebral disc using diffusion tensor imaging technique. Five healthy subjects participated into the data acquisition. Fiber extraction and tracking algorithms were used. The number of fibers in L4/5 disc ranges from 314 to 679 and the mean fiber length L4/5 in disc ranges from 8.22 ± 2.36 mm to 11.24 ± 5.17 mm. This study showed the feasibility of using diffusion tensor imaging technique to detect and assess the nervous fibers in the intervertebral discs. This could be of great clinical interest for the study of the correlations between these useful characteristics with pain levels on the low back pain patients.

Keywords

biodiffusion; biomedical MRI; bone; data acquisition; feature extraction; geometry; medical disorders; medical image processing; natural fibres; neurophysiology; object tracking; tensors; L4 disc; L5 disc; data acquisition; diffusion tensor imaging technique; fiber extraction algorithms; fiber number range; fiber tracking algorithms; in vivo nervous fiber distribution assessment; intervertebral disc; low back pain patient; mean fiber length range; nervous fiber detection; pain level correlations; Back; Biomedical imaging; Diffusion tensor imaging; In vivo; Pain; Tensile stress;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society (EMBC), 2014 36th Annual International Conference of the IEEE

Conference_Location

Chicago, IL

ISSN

1557-170X

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/EMBC.2014.6944096

Filename

6944096