Current Clinical Applications of Diffusion-Tensor Imaging in Neurological Disorders

Diffusion-tensor imaging (DTI) is a noninvasive medical imaging tool used to investigate the structure of white matter. The signal contrast in DTI is generated by differences in the Brownian motion of the water molecules in brain tissue. Postprocessed DTI scalars can be used to evaluate changes in the brain tissue caused by disease, disease progression, and treatment responses, which has led to an enormous amount of interest in DTI in clinical research. This review article provides insights into DTI scalars and the biological background of DTI as a relatively new neuroimaging modality.

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  DTI scalars like FA, AD, RD, MD, and MO can be correlated with clinical information to reveal abnormalities associated with neurological diseases.
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  Advanced DTI postprocessing techniques have yielded novel anatomical and structural pathway information about the brain.
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  Improvements in DTI acquisition techniques and standardization of postprocessing methods will guarantee the utilization of DTI in clinical research and even as a diagnostic tool.