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Open Imaging Index
MRI PET Brain

BIODEP

BIOmarkers in DEPression (BIODEP) study, Wellcome NIMA consortium

Brain MRI and TSPO PET/MR of adults with major depression and healthy controls, grouped by blood CRP, to test whether inflammation marks a subgroup of depression. 143 adults aged 25 to 50 with MRI, 76 with PET. No published data sharing route.

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Overview

BIODEP is a UK observational case-control study run by the Wellcome Trust Neuroimmunology of Mood Disorders and Alzheimer's Disease (NIMA) consortium, jointly sponsored by Cambridgeshire and Peterborough NHS Foundation Trust and the University of Cambridge (REC 15/EE/0092). It asks whether inflammation marks a subgroup of people with major depression. A primary cohort gave clinical data and blood only. A secondary cohort of depressed cases and healthy controls added brain MRI, and a subset of it also had TSPO PET and, in a few people, lumbar puncture. This entry covers the imaging of the secondary cohort.

Composition

Kitzbichler et al. (2021) report complete data for 143 adults aged 25 to 50: 53 healthy controls, 55 depressed cases with C-reactive protein (CRP) below 3 mg/L and 35 with CRP above 3 mg/L. After MRI quality control, 129 remained (84 women, 45 men; mean age 35.5 years in controls and 37.1 in cases). Cases had a Hamilton depression score above 13 at enrolment and again before scanning. Schubert et al. (2021) describe 76 people with PET: 51 depressed cases (31 low CRP, 20 high CRP) and 25 controls. Participants were recruited in Brighton, Cambridge, Glasgow, London (King's College) and Oxford.

Acquisition

MRI took place at Cambridge, King's College London and Oxford, on Siemens and GE scanners. The protocol included quantitative magnetization transfer (spoiled gradient echo, 10 flip angle and offset combinations, 2.4 x 2.4 x 2.5 mm) and 10.7 minutes of multi-echo resting-state EPI (TE 15, 34 and 54 ms, TR 2.57 s, 250 volumes). PET used 60-minute dynamic [11C]PK11195 acquisitions on a GE SIGNA PET/MR with a simultaneous T1-weighted BRAVO scan. Blood CRP was measured in one central laboratory.

Annotations

No image annotations. Labels are case or control status, CRP group, treatment response and clinical questionnaire scores.

Known limitations

  • Not public. No data sharing statement or terms are published; the HRA summary only names a study contact.
  • Field strengths and per-site scanner counts are not reported in the sources checked.
  • The overlap between the 143 MRI participants and the 76 PET participants is not reported.
  • Quantitative MRI could not be harmonised between the Siemens and GE sites, so one site was left out of some analyses.

Cohort

Aggregate numbers from the sources below. Bars are relative to the 143 subjects.

Sex

  • Female 84 65%
  • Male 45 35%

Covers 129 of 143 subjects.

Table 1 in Kitzbichler et al. 2021, Molecular Psychiatry (PMC8872995)

Contrast / sequence

Groups can overlap

  • T1-weighted 76 53%

Methods: TSPO PET Data Acquisition and Analysis in Schubert et al. 2021, Biological Psychiatry Cognitive Neuroscience and Neuroimaging (PMC8264953)

Condition

Groups can overlap

  • Major depressive disorder 90 63%
  • Healthy control 53 37%

Methods: Study design and sample in Kitzbichler et al. 2021, Molecular Psychiatry (PMC8872995)

Country

  • United Kingdom 143 100%

Methods: Study design and sample in Kitzbichler et al. 2021, Molecular Psychiatry, Supplementary Information

Modality

  • MRI 143 100%
  • PET 76 53%

Methods: Study design and sample in Kitzbichler et al. 2021, Molecular Psychiatry (PMC8872995); Methods: Participants in Schubert et al. 2021, Biological Psychiatry Cognitive Neuroscience and Neuroimaging (PMC8264953)

PET tracer

  • [11C]PK11195 76 53%

Methods: Participants in Schubert et al. 2021, Biological Psychiatry Cognitive Neuroscience and Neuroimaging (PMC8264953)

Scanner vendor

  • GE HealthCare 76 53%

Methods: TSPO PET Data Acquisition and Analysis in Schubert et al. 2021, Biological Psychiatry Cognitive Neuroscience and Neuroimaging (PMC8264953)

License and access

Our reading of the license, not legal advice. Before you use the data, read the original license and confirm that your use is allowed. We take no responsibility for how you use a dataset. Full disclaimer

Access
On request

Ask the authors or the data holder. No published process or terms, and access is at their discretion

The NHS Health Research Authority summary names Edward T. Bullmore (University of Cambridge) as the study contact. None of the imaging papers has a statement on access to the data.

Access page

No published license or data use terms

The data holder has published no license and no data use terms. Any use, sharing or commercial right has to be agreed with the data holder, and nothing can be assumed to be allowed. Default copyright and data protection law still apply.

The HRA research summary describes the study and its results but gives no data sharing terms. The data availability statement of Kitzbichler et al. (2021) covers only the analysis software, and Schubert et al. (2021) and Althubaity et al. (2022) have none. The study's page on the NIMA consortium website could not be reached.

Original license text Checked 2026-10-08

What you can do

  • Commercial use Not stated
  • Not stated
  • Train ML models Not stated
  • Create derived data Not stated
  • Publish results Not stated

What you can share

  • Share the data Not stated
  • Share derived data Not stated
  • Share trained models Not stated

What you must do

  • Cite or credit Not stated
  • Share alike Not stated
  • Sign an agreement Not stated
  • Ethics approval Not stated
  • Manuscript review Not stated
  • Release code Not stated
  • Return results Not stated
  • Delete after use Not stated

Limits

  • No re-identification Not stated
  • Location limits Not stated

Citation

Kitzbichler MG, Aruldass AR, Barker GJ, Wood TC, Dowell NG, Hurley SA, McLean J, Correia M, Clarke C, Pointon L, Cavanagh J, Cowen P, Pariante C, Cercignani M, Bullmore ET, Harrison NA, NIMA Consortium. Peripheral inflammation is associated with micro-structural and functional connectivity changes in depression-related brain networks. Molecular Psychiatry 26, 7346-7354 (2021). doi:10.1038/s41380-021-01272-1

Sources

Every number on this page comes from one of these documents. Each chart names the table or page it is taken from. The raw numbers are in stats.csv.