Non-Invasive Imaging Markers for the Characterization of Cerebrovascular Involvement in Alzheimer’s Disease
Cardiovascular disease, as well as cerebrovascular disease (CVD), has a strong link with both mild cognitive impairment and AD dementia; however, the question of whether CVD modulates underlying pathophysiology of AD has only recently begun receiving attention. To provide insights into AD relationships, non-invasive Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) has been utilized in longitudinal studies of AD risk-enriched populations. However, clinically available MRI techniques lack sensitivity and specificity to address key vascular hypotheses in AD studies. MRI methods commonly employed today such as fluid attenuation and susceptibility imaging only indirectly measure CVD and cannot inform on the dynamic flow and vascular motion phenomena that are hypothesized to interact with AD related pathology. This talk will present a variety of MRI strategies designed to improve characterization of CVD in AD, specifically cerebrovascular flow dynamics and vessel stiffness. Findings in risk-enriched populations and biomarker confirmed AD will be presented. Other neurovascular applications will be demonstrated. The talk will close by discussing perspectives towards neuroimaging at ultra-high field MRI (e.g. 7T), current challenges, and the potential for novel vascular marker development.
About the Speaker
Completed undergraduate studies in applied physics at the University of Puerto Rico – Humacao. Later earned a PhD in Physics at the University of Wisconsin – Madison (UW-Madison) for work on MRI methods for cerebrovascular hemodynamics assessment. This was followed by a post-doctorate in the Department of Medical Physics at UW-Madison working on accelerated Non-Cartesian sampling and constrained image reconstruction approaches across a wide range of applications including motion encoded pulse sequences, contrast-enhanced MRI and neurovascular applications. Currently, I am an assistant scientist in the Wisconsin Alzheimer’s Disease Research Center at UW-Madison working in close collaboration with investigators from the Departments of Medicine, Radiology and Medical Physics. My research interests include the characterization of neurovascular health using innovative MRI methods including accelerate data acquisition, image reconstruction and post-processing strategies.
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