Fractal Analysis of Creutzfeld-Jakob Disease Frontal Horn Brain Magnetic Resonance Image

The Higuchi fractal method on a random series was applied to the study of the brightness fluctuation of Creutzfeld-Jakob disease (CJD) brain magnetic resonance (MR) frontal horn images. The brightness fluctuation along either a horizontal or vertical direction across an image formed a random series suitable for the Higuchi method. The average fractal dimension was found to decrease for the CJD frontal horn images (1.95) when compared to normal frontal horn images (1.97). The t-test gave a probability of about 7% that the CJD fractal dimension values would be a subset of a normal frontal horn dataset. Another MRI dataset taken later was also analyzed. The fractal dimension had increased to be about 1.99. Since the theoretical maximum fractal dimension for a line object is 2, a one-tailed t- test was used. The probability that the near expiration fractal dimension values coming from sampling from a normal dataset is about 15%. Extension to Parkinson MR images is discussed. The Higuchi fractal method could be used as a supplemental tool for extracting additional information and progress monitoring.