Myelin Measurement: Comparison Between Simultaneous Tissue Relaxometry, Magnetization Transfer Saturation Index, and T1w/T2w Ratio Methods

Magnetization transfer (MT) imaging has been widely used for estimating myelin content in the brain. Recently, two other approaches, namely simultaneous tissue relaxometry of R₁ and R₂ relaxation rates and proton density (SyMRI) and the ratio of T₁-weighted to T₂-weighted images (T₁w/T₂w ratio), were also proposed as methods for measuring myelin. SyMRI and MT imaging have been reported to correlate well with actual myelin by histology. However, for T₁w/T₂w ratio, such evidence is limited. In 20 healthy adults, we examined the correlation between these three methods, using MT saturation index (MT_sat) for MT imaging. After calibration, white matter (WM) to gray matter (GM) contrast was the highest for SyMRI among these three metrics. Even though SyMRI and MT_sat showed strong correlation in the WM (r = 0.72), only weak correlation was found between T₁w/T₂w and SyMRI (r = 0.45) or MT_sat (r = 0.38) (correlation coefficients significantly different from each other, with p values < 0.001). In subcortical and cortical GM, these measurements showed moderate to strong correlations to each other (r = 0.54 to 0.78). In conclusion, the high correlation between SyMRI and MT_sat indicates that both methods are similarly suited to measure myelin in the WM, whereas T₁w/T₂w ratio may be less optimal.