New X-ray Method Provides Better Understanding Of Brain Disorders

Posted on: Friday, 13 May 2011,

Researchers including members from the Niels Bohr Institute at the University of Copenhagen have developed a new method for making detailed X-ray images of brain cells. The method, called SAXS-CT, can map the myelin sheaths of nerve cells, which are important for conditions such as multiple sclerosis and Alzheimer’s disease. The results have been published in the scientific journal, NeuroImage.

The myelin sheaths of nerve cells are lamellar membranes surrounding the neuronal axons. The myelin layers are important to the central nervous system as they ensure the rapid and uninterrupted communication of signals along the neuronal axons. Changes in the myelin layers are associated with a number of neurodegenerative disorders such as cerebral malaria, multiple sclerosis, and Alzheimer’s disease.

The development of these diseases are still not fully understood, but are thought to be related to the damage of the myelin layers, so that messages from the brain reach the various parts of the body poorly or not at all. It is like an electric cord where the insulating material has been damaged and the current short circuits. In order to find methods to prevent or treat the diseases it is important to understand the connection between the diseases and the changes in the myelin.

“We have combined two well-known medical examination methods: SAXS (Small-Angle X-ray Scattering) and CT-scanning (computed tomography scanning). Combined with a specially developed program for data processing, we have been able to examine the variations of the myelin sheaths in a rat brain all the way down to the molecular level without surgery”, explains PhD Torben Haugaard Jensen, Niels Bohr Institute at the University of Copenhagen. The method is called ‘Molecular X-ray CT’, because you use X-ray CT to study myelin at the molecular level.

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