Longitudinal MRI for the detection of a typical pattern of cerebral blood flow and tissue integrity changes after stroke in ischaemia tolerant rats

Introduction: The individual vulnerability to ischaemia has a significant impact on outcome in stroke patients. Therapeutic interventions could be much better tailored to the patient if information about the individual resistance to ischemic injury was available. Tolerance to ischaemia can be induced experimentally by „preconditioning“. One preconditioning model is the injection of 3-nitroproprionic acid (3NPA), a respiratory chain inhibitor. We used MRI in adult rats to characterize how preconditioning with 3NPA affects the development of a stroke lesion and if a typical „MRI signature“ of preconditioned tissue…