Exploring Peritumoral Neural Tracts by Using Neurite Orientation Dispersion and Density Imaging

Diffusion Tensor Imaging (DTI) tractography has been widely used in brain tumor surgery to ensure thorough resection and minimize functional damage. However, due to enhanced anisotropic uncertainty in the area with peritumoral edema, diffusion tractography is generally not practicable leading to high false-negative results in neural tracking. In this study, we evaluated the usefulness of the neurite orientation dispersion and density imaging (NODDI) derived tractography for investigating structural heterogeneity of the brain in patients with brain tumor. A total of 24 patients with brain tumors, characterized by peritumoral edema, and 10 healthy counterparts were recruited from 2014 to 2021. All participants underwent magnetic resonance imaging. Moreover, we used the images obtained from the healthy participants for calibrating the orientation dispersion threshold for NODDI-derived corticospinal tract (CST) reconstruction. Compared to DTI, NODDI-derived tractography has a great potential to improve the reconstruction of fiber tracking through regions of vasogenic edema. The regions with edematous CST in NODDI-derived tractography demonstrated a significant decrease in the intracellular volume fraction (VF_ic, p < 0.000) and an increase in the isotropic volume fraction (VF_iso, p < 0.014). Notably, the percentage of the involved volume of the concealed CST and lesion-to-tract distance could reflect the motor function of the patients. After the tumor resection, four patients with 1–5 years follow-up were showed subsidence of the vasogenic edema and normal CST on DTI tractography. NODDI-derived tractography revealed tracts within the edematous area and could assist neurosurgeons to locate the neural tracts that are otherwise not visualized by conventional DTI tractography.