A comparative VBM study of longitudinal neuroanatomical changes in AD transgenic mouse models

摘要

Neurodegeneration and signs of atrophy in brain areas such as the hippocampus and entorhinal cortex are typical for Alzheimer's disease (AD). To various extents, available transgenic (TG) mouse models of AD recapitulate such hallmarks of the disease as amyloid and tangle pathology, cognitive impairment, synaptic and neuronal loss. Less is known, however, about the brain volumetric changes over time in different genetic strains. Voxel-based morphometry (VBM) of structural MRIs is an in vivo method used to study subtle volumetric changes over time in the whole brain longitudinally. Although it has been seldom used in mice, recent developments in automated image analysis algorithms made it a bridgeable gap.