Poster - Improving Neuromelanin-Sensitive MRI Measurement
In a poster presented this week at the ADPD 2026 Alzheimer's & Parkinsons Diseases Conference IXICO outlines how improving the reliability of measuring neuromelanin, a dark pigment in the brain that accumulates with age and is increasingly used as a biomarker to detect early stage Parkinson’s disease and disease progression, could improve disease diagnosis, understanding and patient stratification.
Neuromelanin-sensitive MRI (NM-MRI) is a promising way to study changes in the substantia nigra, a brain region affected in Parkinson’s disease. Neuromelanin is found within dopaminergic neurons in this region. The loss of these neurons, one of the hallmarks of Parkinson’s disease, can lead to measurable changes in neuromelanin signal. However, the high-resolution NM-MRI scans required to capture this signal can introduce significant variations in image quality and resolution known as 'MRI image noise'.
In our recent work, we evaluated how different preprocessing steps can improve NM-MRI image quality before downstream analysis. By applying a structured preprocessing pipeline to repeated scans, we found that these steps significantly improved signal quality and reduced noise compared with conventional approaches.
Improving the reliability of NM-MRI measurements could strengthen analyses and support the development of better biomarkers and stratification strategies for Parkinson’s disease research.
