Prenatal cerebral ischemia disrupts MRI-defined cortical microstructure through disturbances in neuronal arborization.

ABSTRACT: Children who survive preterm birth exhibit persistent unexplained disturbances in cerebral cortical growth with associated cognitive and learning disabilities. The mechanisms underlying these deficits remain elusive. We used ex vivo diffusion magnetic resonance imaging to demonstrate in a preterm large-animal model that cerebral ischemia impairs cortical growth and the normal maturational decline in cortical fractional anisotropy (FA). Analysis of pyramidal neurons revealed that cortical deficits were associated with impaired expansion of the dendritic arbor and reduced synaptic density. Together, these findings suggest a link between abnormal cortical FA and disturbances of neuronal morphological development. To experimentally investigate this possibility, we measured the orientation dist

SUBMITTER: Dean JM 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3857141 | biostudies-literature | 2013 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature