title: Increased Echogenicity and Radiodense Foci on Echocardiogram and MicroCT in Murine Myocarditis.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To address the question as to whether echocardiographic and/or microcomputed tomography (microCT) analysis can be utilized to assess the extent of Coxsackie B virus (CVB) induced myocarditis in the absence of left ventricular dysfunction in the mouse.
  
  
  BACKGROUND
  Viral myocarditis is a significant clinical problem with associated inflammation of the myocardium and myocardial injury. Murine models of myocarditis are commonly used to study the pathophysiology of the disease, but methods for imaging the mouse myocardium have been limited to echocardiographic assessment of ventricular dysfunction and, to a lesser extent, MRI imaging.
  
  
  METHODS
  Using a murine model of myocarditis, we used both echocardiography and microCT to assess the extent of myocardial involvement in murine myocarditis using both wild-type mice and CVB cleavage-resistant dystrophin knock-in mice.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Areas of increased echogenicity were only observed in the myocardium of Coxsackie B virus infected mice. These echocardiographic abnormalities correlated with the extent of von Kossa staining (a marker of membrane permeability), inflammation, and fibrosis. Given that calcium phosphate uptake as imaged by von Kossa staining might also be visualized using microCT, we utilized microCT imaging which allowed for high-resolution, 3-dimensional images of radiodensities that likely represent calcium phosphate uptake. As with echocardiography, only mice infected with Coxsackie B virus displayed abnormal accumulation of calcium within individual myocytes indicating increased membrane permeability only upon exposure to virus.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  These studies demonstrate new, quantitative, and semi-quantitative imaging approaches for the assessment of myocardial involvement in the setting of viral myocarditis in the commonly utilized mouse model of viral myocarditis.
authors.affiliation: Department of Medicine, University of California San Diego, San Diego, California, United States of America.|BioFrontiers, University of Colorado, Boulder, Colorado, United States of America.
authors.forename: Angela K
authors.initials: AK
authors.lastname: Peter
authors.affiliation: Department of Medicine, University of California San Diego, San Diego, California, United States of America.
authors.forename: William H
authors.initials: WH
authors.lastname: Bradford
authors.affiliation: Department of Medicine, University of California San Diego, San Diego, California, United States of America.
authors.forename: Nancy D
authors.initials: ND
authors.lastname: Dalton
authors.affiliation: Department of Medicine, University of California San Diego, San Diego, California, United States of America.
authors.forename: Yusu
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Gu
authors.affiliation: Department of Medicine, University of California San Diego, San Diego, California, United States of America.|Department of Internal Medicine, Mayo Clinic College of Medicine, Phoenix, Arizona, United States of America.|Department of Medicine, John H. Stroger Jr. Hospital of Cook County, Chicago, Illinois, United States of America.
authors.forename: Chieh-Ju
authors.initials: CJ
authors.lastname: Chao
authors.affiliation: Department of Medicine, University of California San Diego, San Diego, California, United States of America.
authors.forename: Kirk L
authors.initials: KL
authors.lastname: Peterson
authors.affiliation: Department of Medicine, University of California San Diego, San Diego, California, United States of America.|Intermountain Heart Institute, Intermountain Medical Center, Salt Lake City, Utah, United States of America.
authors.forename: Kirk U
authors.initials: KU
authors.lastname: Knowlton
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D003384:Coxsackievirus Infections / Q000150:complications* / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000473:pathology; D004195:Disease Models, Animal; D016189:Dystrophin / Q000235:genetics; D004452:Echocardiography; D029822:Enterovirus B, Human / Q000502:physiology; D006367:HeLa Cells; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D051379:Mice; D008822:Mice, Transgenic; D009205:Myocarditis / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000235:genetics / Q000473:pathology / Q000821:virology*; D009206:Myocardium / Q000473:pathology*; D018487:Ventricular Dysfunction, Left / Q000473:pathology / Q000821:virology; D055114:X-Ray Microtomography
chemical_list: D016189:Dystrophin