New imaging technique captures COVID-19’s impact on the brain

The novel technique might also be able to detect breast and prostate cancers A University of Waterloo engineer's MRI invention reveals better than many existing imaging technologies how COVID-19 can change the human brain. The new imaging technique known as correlated diffusion imaging (CDI) was developed by systems design engineering professor Alexander Wong and recently used in a groundbreaking study by scientists at Baycrest's Rotman Research Institute and Sunnybrook Hospital in Toronto. "Some may think COVID-19 affects just the lungs," Dr. Wong said. "What was found is that this new MRI technique that we created is very good at identifying changes to the brain due to COVID-19. COVID-19 changes the white matter in the brain." Wong, a Canada Research Chair in Artificial Intelligence and Medical Imaging, had previously developed CDI in a successful search for a better imaging measure for detecting cancer. CDI is a new form of MRI that can better highlight the differences in the way water molecules move in tissue by capturing and mixing MRI signals at different gradient pulse strengths and timings. Researchers at Rotman, a world-renowned centre for the study of brain function, saw Wong's imaging discovery and thought it could likely also be used to identify changes to the brain due to COVID-19.