Introduction: Autopsy findings have shown the entorhinal cortex and transentorhinal cortex are among the earliest sites of accumulation of pathology in patients developing Alzheimer's disease.
Methods: Here, we study this region in subjects with mild cognitive impairment (n = 36) and in control subjects (n = 16). The cortical areas are manually segmented, and local volume and shape changes are quantified using diffeomorphometry, including a novel mapping procedure that reduces variability in anatomic definitions over time.
Results: We find significant thickness and volume changes localized to the transentorhinal cortex through high field strength atlasing.
Discussion: This demonstrates that in vivo neuroimaging biomarkers can detect these early changes among subjects with mild cognitive impairment.
Keywords: Braak staging; Diffeomorphometry; Entorhinal cortex; Longitudinal analysis; Mild cognitive impairment; Shape analysis.