The brain after COVID-19: Compensatory neurogenesis or persistent neuroinflammation?
Elkhonon Goldberg, Kenneth Podell, Daniel K. Sodickson, Els Fieremans
Abstract
Yiping Lu et al. [1] report increased grey matter volumes and changes in MRI-based measures of water diffusion in white matter in the brains of recovered COVID-19 patients three months after acute illness, compared to healthy controls. They propose that neurogenesis and hypertrophy caused volumetric enlargement, and pathway remyelination restricted diffusion in the patients. If valid, these explanations suggest vigorous and counter-intuitive compensatory brain mechanisms during recovery from COVID-19.
Topics & Concepts
MedicineNeurogenesisCoronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19)White matterRemyelinationNeuroinflammationDiffusion MRI2019-20 coronavirus outbreakNeuroscienceGrey matterBrain edemaSevere acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2)PathologyInternal medicineMagnetic resonance imagingInflammationCentral nervous systemPsychologyDiseaseMyelinRadiologyOutbreakInfectious disease (medical specialty)Advanced Neuroimaging Techniques and ApplicationsLong-Term Effects of COVID-19Multiple Sclerosis Research Studies