Multiple sclerosis plaques may undergo continuous myelin degradation: a cross-sectional study with myelin and axon-related quantitative magnetic resonance imaging metrics.

Purpose: We hypothesize that myelin is more susceptible to damage over time than axons. We investigated the association between the estimated duration from the onset of multiple sclerosis (MS) plaques and myelin- and axon-related quantitative synthetic magnetic resonance imaging (SyMRI) and neurite orientation dispersion and density imaging (NODDI) metrics.

Methods: We analyzed 31 patients with MS with 73 newly appeared plaques. Simple linear regression analysis was performed to assess the association between the estimated duration from the onset of plaques and quantitative MRI metrics. These metrics included the myelin volume fraction (MVF), axon volume fraction, and g-ratio in plaque and normal-appearing white matter.

Results: MS plaques with a longer estimated duration from onset were significantly correlated with a lower MVF (slope =  - 0.0070, R = 0.0970), higher g-ratio (slope = 0.0078, R = 0.0842) (all P values < 0.05).

Conclusion: These results suggested that myelin in plaques undergoes continuous damage, more so than axons. Myelin imaging with SyMRI and NODDI may be useful for the quantitative assessment of temporal changes in MS plaques.