Test-retest reproducibility of [11C]-l-deprenyl-D2 binding to MAO-B in the human brain

[11C]-l-deprenyl-D2 is a positron emission tomography (PET) radioligand for measurement of the monoamine oxidase B (MAO-B) activity in vivo brain. The estimation of the test-retest reproducibility is important for accurate interpretation of PET studies. We performed two [11C]-l-deprenyl-D2 scans for six healthy subjects and evaluated the test-retest variability of this radioligand. MAO-B binding was quantified by two tissue compartment model (2TCM) with three rate constants (K 1, k 2, k 3) using metabolite-corrected plasma radioactivity. The λk 3 defined as (K 1/k 2) × k 3 was also calculated. The correlation between MAO-B binding and age, and the effect of partial volume effect correction (PVEc) for the reproducibility were also estimated. %difference of k 3 was 2.6% (medial frontal cortex) to 10.3% (hippocampus), and that of λk 3 was 5.0% (thalamus) to 9.2% (cerebellum). Mean %difference of all regions were 5.3 and 7.0% in k 3 and λk 3, respectively. All regions showed below 10% variabilities except the hippocampus in k 3 (10.3%). Intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) of k 3 was 0.78 (hippocampus) to 0.98 (medial frontal cortex), and that of λk 3 was 0.78 (hippocampus) to 0.95 (thalamus). Mean ICC were 0.94 and 0.89 in k 3 and λk 3, respectively. The highest positive correlation with age was observed in the hippocampus, as r = 0.75 in k 3 and 0.76 in λk 3. After PVEc, mean %difference were 5.6 and 7.2% in k 3 and λk 3, respectively. Mean ICC were 0.92 and 0.90 for k 3 and λk 3, respectively. These values were almost the same as those before PVEc. The present results indicate that k 3 and λk 3 of [11C]-l-deprenyl-D2 are reliable parameters for test-retest reproducibility with healthy subjects both before and after PVEc. The studies with patients of larger sample size are required for further clinical applications.