MRF MND
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Novel MRI for an earlier diagnosis of motor neurone disease
IRAS ID
353702
Contact name
Stuart Currie
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust
Duration of Study in the UK
1 years, 5 months, 29 days
Research summary
Motor Neuron Disease (MND) is a fatal, rapidly progressing disease that affects the brain and spinal cord. The last decade has produced game-changing gene therapies but to be effective these must be given early in the disease before damage becomes irreversible. However, despite decades of research, patients still typically wait 12 months between symptom onset and diagnosis.
What is needed is an accurate and widely available test sensitive to the earliest stages of the disease so that the correct patients can be fast-tracked to see a neurologist allowing earlier therapeutic intervention.
Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) uses how the body interacts with the scanner's magnet to produce images. These images show how the brain looks, whether abnormal or normal. Patients with MND may still have a normal-looking MRI scan despite having loss of normal bodily function. Unlike the standard MRI, MR Fingerprinting (MRF) is a novel MRI technique that provides measurements (numbers) of underlying brain tissue properties, not just what the brain looks like.
We hypothesise that MRF will detect abnormality in parts of the brain commonly affected by MND that appear visually normal on conventional structural MRI.
As far as we are aware, this will be the first use of MRF in patients with MND in the world. As such, we propose a pilot study where 10 patients with MND and 10 age-matched healthy volunteers will undergo MRI of the brain including MRF. No intravenous injection is required.
Measurements of the brain obtained using MRF will be compared between patients with MND and those from age-matched healthy volunteers. Differences between the two groups will be sought (looking at any trends and any statistically significant variations).
It is hoped that MRF will distinguish areas of the brain that are diseased in patients with MND and therefore identify new potential diagnostic markers.
REC name
Yorkshire & The Humber - Leeds West Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
25/YH/0184
Date of REC Opinion
2 Sep 2025
REC opinion
Favourable Opinion