Motor cortex glutathione deficit in ALS measured in vivo with the J-editing technique.

Publication Type	Academic Article
Authors	Weiduschat N, Mao X, Hupf J, Armstrong N, Kang G, Lange D, Mitsumoto H, Shungu D
Journal	Neurosci Lett
Volume	570
Pagination	102-7
Date Published	04/24/2014
ISSN	1872-7972
Keywords	Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis, Glutathione, Motor Cortex
Abstract	This study compared in vivo levels of the antioxidant glutathione (GSH) in the motor cortex of 11 ALS patients with those in 11 age-matched healthy volunteers (HV). Using the standard J-edited spin-echo difference MRS technique, GSH spectra were recorded on a 3.0 T GE MR system from a single precentral gyrus voxel. GSH levels expressed as ratios to the unsuppressed voxel tissue water (W) were 31% lower in ALS patients than in HV (p=.005), and 36% lower in ALS than in HV (p=.02) when expressed as ratios to the total creatine peak (tCr), supporting a role for oxidative stress in ALS. Levels of the putative neuronal marker N-acetylaspartate (NAA) relative to W did not differ between ALS and HV (p=.26), but were lower by 9% in ALS than in HV (p=.013) when expressed as ratios relative to tCr. This discrepancy is attributed to small but opposite changes in NAA and tCr in ALS that, as a ratio, resulted in a statistically significant group difference, further suggesting caution in using tCr as an internal reference under pathological conditions.
DOI	10.1016/j.neulet.2014.04.020
PubMed ID	24769125