SBIR/STTR Award attributes
Project Summary Abstract The overall goal of this project is to deliver an automated PET image analysis tool to be used in a clinical setting that quickly evaluates the PET images and reports PET standard uptake utilization rates from the corresponding MRI segmented anatomical locations to determine patientsrisk of developing Alzheimer s diseaseADWhile multiple research studies have highlighted the utility of using PET imaging in diagnosis of AD and stratification of patients for the possible conversion from mild cognitive impairmentMCIto ADthe research methods used are far from being available as a versatile tool that can be utilized in a clinical settingIn addition to the common ligandF FDGmultiple Alzheimer s relevant ligands have been recently introducedC PiBF FlorbetapirF FlorbetabenF flutemetamolas well as THKTHKAVand PBBAn automated PET image analysis tool will be timely and will make the best use of the newly introduced PET ligandsThe advance of Alzheimer s relevant ligands will likely improve diagnosis of AD and monitoring of disease progressionIn phase I of our projectwe will develop methods that assist in diagnosis of AD and calculate the odds of MCI to AD conversion using automated processing of PET dataFDGPETand MRI atrophy measuresIn phaseof our proposalwe will extend our methods to include the new PET ligandsThe amyloidand tau specific ligands present with different brain distributionsand will enhance our understanding of the dynamic details of the Alzheimer s footprint in the brainThe degree of cortical binding of amyloid agents in patients with AD is variableand the quantitative evaluation will require calculating normative data for the new ligandsAs an additional confounderthe amyloid binding can exist in non AD patients such as patients with Lewy body dementia or cerebral amyloid angiopathySimilar to amyloiddeposition in non AD entitiesvarious tauopathies in addition to Alzheimer s disease will show tau ligand depositions in the patientsbrainWe will determine normative values for each segmented brain region for multiple PET ligands currently available and calculate MRI atrophy measuresUsing all regional PET measurements and MRI atrophy measures we will develop an automatic classification algorithm that will separate AD patients from non AD controlsand also compute MCI to AD conversion risk for each MCI subject Project Narrative The overall goal of this project is to deliver an automated PET image analysis tool which can be used in a clinical setting and quickly evaluates the PET images and report values from the corresponding MRI segmented anatomical locations to determine the Alzheimer s DiseaseADrisk of patientsWe will determine normative values for each segmented brain region for multiple PET ligands currently availableand also calculate MRI atrophy measuresUsing all regional PET measurements and MRI atrophy measureswe will develop an automatic classification algorithm that will separate AD patients from controls and also compute the risk of conversion from mild cognitive impairmentMCIto AD for each patient
