Noise-referenced multi-shell diffusion-weighted imaging for regional cerebrospinal fluid thermometry

A noise-referenced multi-shell diffusion-weighted imaging method estimates cerebrospinal fluid temperature separately in lateral ventricles and subarachnoid space, finding ventricular temperatures higher by 2.4 {+/-} 1.2 degrees C across 12 participants.

• Why it matters: CSF thermometry needs a way to verify that regional temperature estimates agree with measurement uncertainty, especially when using shared reference signals across diffusion weightings.
• What they did: The method uses measured image noise to test voxel-wise agreement among temperature estimates from four non-zero diffusion weightings, retaining only voxels consistent with noise expectations.
• The result: Mean diffusion-derived temperature was 38.4 {+/-} 0.4 degrees C in lateral ventricles versus 36.0 {+/-} 1.1 degrees C in subarachnoid space, with the ventricular–subarachnoid difference persisting under alternative noise models and estimators.

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