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Objective:To investigate the effect of SCN1A gene polymorphism (SCN1A-rs3812718) on the alterations of spontaneous brain activity using amplitude of low-frequency fluctuations (ALFF) of MR in patients with temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE).Methods:A total of 37 TLE patients (TLE group) admitted to the Epilepsy Center of the 900th Hospital of Joint Logistic Team from March 2018 to August 2019 were retrospectively analyzed, and another 28 healthy volunteers matched for gender, age, and years of education with the TLE group were selected as the healthy control group (HC group). Sixty-five subjects were divided into four groups by genotype and diagnosis: 34 cases in AA/AG-TLE subgroup, 3 cases in GG-TLE subgroup, 20 cases in AA/AG-HC subgroup and 8 cases in GG-HC subgroup. All subjects underwent sagittal 3D-T 1WI and resting-state functional MRI using a Siemens 3.0 T Trio Tim MR scanner. Then ALFF values of the four groups were calculated using DPABI by the MATLAB 2010 platform. The ALFF values between two groups were compared by independent samples t-test. The ALFF values of different genotypes at rs3812718 locus in TLE and HC group were analyzed by multivariate analysis of variance to find out the corresponding brain regions with interaction, and then post hoc simple effect analysis was performed. Results:The ALFF values in TLE group significantly increased in left marginal lobe, left parahippocampal gyrus, left fusiform gyrus, left hippocampus, right insular lobe and right inferior temporal gyrus (Alphasim corrected P<0.001) and decreased in the left superior frontal gyrus, left middle frontal gyrus, left inferior frontal gyrus, right middle frontal gyrus, right precuneus, left precuneus, bilateral cingulate gyrus and right angular gyrus (Alphasim correction P<0.05) compared with HC group. Subjects carrying the non-risk G allele had higher ALFF values in the right inferior temporal gyrus, right fusiform gyrus, and right cerebellum than subjects carrying the risk A allele ( t=3.30, Alphasim corrected P=0.002). There was a significant interaction effect on posterior cerebellar lobe, left anterior cerebellar lobe, left inferior temporal gyrus, left superior parietal lobule and right precuneus of TLE patients with SCN1A-rs3812718 genotype. Post-hoc simple effect analysis showed that ALFF significantly increased in the left posterior cerebellar lobe, left anterior cerebellar lobe, left inferior temporal gyrus and left fusiform gyrus in GG-TLE subgroup ( t=5.97, P<0.001), but significantly decreased in the right superior parietal lobule, right precuneus, right posterior cerebellar lobe in AA/AG-TLE subgroup compared to the HC group. Compared with GG-TLE subgroup, ALFF in left posterior cerebellar lobe, left fusiform gyrus and left inferior temporal gyrus decreased in AA/AG-TLE subgroup. Conclusion:SCN1A gene polymorphism in the rs3812718 locus affects spontaneous neural activity in resting state, which may be one of the pathophysiological mechanisms of TLE.
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ZNF804A rs1344706 has been identified as one of the risk genes for schizophrenia. However, the neural mechanisms underlying this association are unknown. Given that ZNF804A upregulates the expression of COMT, we hypothesized that ZNF804A may influence brain activity by interacting with COMT. Here, we genotyped ZNF804A rs1344706 and COMT rs4680 in 218 healthy Chinese participants. Amplitudes of low-frequency fluctuations (ALFFs) were applied to analyze the main and interaction effects of ZNF804A rs1344706 and COMT rs4680. The ALFFs of the bilateral dorsolateral prefrontal cortex showed a significant ZNF804A rs1344706 × COMT rs4680 interaction, manifesting as a U-shaped modulation, presumably by dopamine signaling. Significant main effects were also found. These findings suggest that ZNF804A affects the resting-state functional activation by interacting with COMT, and may improve our understanding of the neurobiological effects of ZNF804A and its association with schizophrenia.
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Objective@#To investigate the alterations of the cerebral resting-state spontaneous neural activity in colorectal cancer patients with depressive symptoms.@*Methods@#Thirty-three colorectal cancer patients (patient group) with depression and 43 healthy subjects (control group) underwent the resting state functional magnetic resonance imaging (rs-fMRI). The amplitude of low-frequency fluctuations (ALFF) and fractional ALFF (fALFF) were calculated. Two independent samples t test were used to compare the ALFF and fALFF values between two groups by DPABI software, and then correlation analysis was performed between ALFF and fALFF with statistical significance and Patient Health Questionnaire (PHQ-9) scores and Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD-7) scores.@*Results@#Compared with the control group, the patient group showed significantly lower ALFF and fALFF values in the bilateral precuneus, calcarine gyrus, lingual gyrus, left cuneus, superior, middle, inferior occipital gyrus and right fusiform gyrus (t=-5.730, P<0.05; t=-4.872, P<0.05). There were no significant correlations between the ALFF and fALFF values in these regions and PHQ-9 or GAD-7 scores (P>0.05).@*Conclusion@#Spontaneous decrease of neural activity in occipital and parietal lobes exists in colorectal cancer patients with depression at resting-sate, which may be a potential neurobiological marker.
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Clinical imaging research of spinal cord has urgent realistic needs, and faces enormous challenges and opportunities. Among them, functional magnetic resonance imaging is a hot and difficult topic because of the particularity of spinal cord structure and related technical bottlenecks. In recent years, advances in magnetic resonance hardware and software technology have led to breakthroughs in the technical nodes, which have opened up a new prospect for the clinical application of spinal cord imaging. The recent progress in functional magnetic resonance imaging of spinal cord is reviewed in this article.
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Objective To investigate regional activity abnormalities of patients with liver cirrhosis before and after liver transplantation using resting-state fMRI and amplitude of low frequency fluctuations (ALFF)method.Methods Totally 11 patients preparing to accept liver transplantation were adopted into liver cirrhosis group and 11 healthy volunteers in the health examination were adopted into the control group. The liver cirrhosis group was investigated at a week before operation and repeatedly a month after liver trans-plantation.Healthy volunteers were investigated at the same time.MR imaging data were obtained from a Phil-ips Achieva 1.5-T MR imager.The imaging data were mainly preprocessed with a MATLAB toolbox called DPARSF.REST software was used to calculate the ALFF value of each subject.A second-level random-effect two-sample t-test was performed on the individual ALFF.Significant differences were set at the standard of a corrected cluster level of P<0.05,and software Xjview 8.1 was adopted to express the outcome.Results (1)Compared with control group,decreased ALFF were found in bilateral middle occipital gyrus(MOG) (MNI:x=36,y=-72,z=9),bilateral precuneus/cuneus(PCu/Cu)/posterior cingulated(PCC)(MNI:x=15,y=-66,z=24),left inferior parietal lobule(LIPL)(MNI:x=-39,y=-54,z=42),and bilateral para-central lobule/cingulate gyrus(MNI:x=3,y=-36,z=45)of cirrhosis patients,no increased ALFF were found.(2)Compared with cirrhosis patients,no increased or decreased ALFF were found in postoperative group.After relaxing standards of statistics,increased ALFF were found in left inferior parietal lobule(IPL) (MNI:x=-39,y=-51,z=42),cingulate gyrus(MNI:x=3,y=-33,z=42),and right middle frontal gyrus (MNI:x=35,y=57,z=0)of postoperative group,no decreased ALFF were found.(3)Compared with control group,decreased ALFF were found in bilateral precuneus/posterior cingulated(PCC),and left middle occipi-tal gyrus(MOG)of postoperative group,no increased ALFF were found.Conclusions Significant decreased ALFF is found in visual cortex(PCu),DMN((PCu/Cu/PCC),and LIPL of cirrrhosis patients,and those ab-normalities reflect the weakness of local neurons spontaneous low-frequency.Compared with beforeoperative group,ALFF of LIPL,in cingulate gyrus,and right middle frontal gyrus have a tendency of rising.One month after liver transplantation,decreased ALFF is found in BA7 and BA 31,suggesting that the spontaneous low-frequency of local neurons haven't recoverd to normal level.
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Objective To explore the energy feature of the spontaneous neural activity in depressive patients with diurnal rhythm.Methods Twenty depressive patients with diurnal rhythm,20 depressive patients without diurnal rhythm and 20 gender-,age-,education-matched healthy controls were scanned with 3.0 T MRI Scanner.According to Results of ANOVA,group-wise two sample t-test was completed.The correlation analysis were conducted between ALFF of significant difference brain regions and the score of Hamilton rating scale for depression.Results The brain regions showing significant differences among three groups were located in the right parahippocampal gyrus(MNI:18,-36,-9;K=136),left parietal lobe(MNI:-54,-45,42;K=86),left cerebellum crus(MNI:-84,-60,36;K=86) and right cerebellum crus(MNI:9,-78,-36;K=91)(P0.05).Conclusion The diurnal rhythm observed in depression may be associated with aberrant activity of parahippocampal gyrus.
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OBJECTIVE: We hypothesize that the amplitude of low-frequency fluctuations (ALFF) is involved in the altered regional baseline brain function in social anxiety disorder (SAD). The aim of the study was to analyze the altered baseline brain activity in drug-naive adult patients with SAD. METHODS: We investigated spontaneous and baseline brain activities by obtaining the resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging data of 20 drug-naive adult SAD patients and 19 healthy controls. Voxels were used to analyze the ALFF values using one- and two-sample t-tests. A post-hoc correlation of clinical symptoms was also performed. RESULTS: Our findings show decreased ALFF in the bilateral insula, left medial superior frontal gyrus, left precuneus, left middle temporal gyrus, right middle temporal pole, and left fusiform gyrus of the SAD group. The SAD patients exhibited significantly increased ALFF in the right inferior temporal gyrus, right middle temporal gyrus, bilateral middle occipital gyrus, orbital superior frontal gyrus, right fusiform gyrus, right medial superior frontal gyrus, and left parahippocampal gyrus. Moreover, the Liebowitz Social Anxiety Scale results for the SAD patients were positively correlated with the mean Z values of the right middle occipital and right inferior occipital but showed a negative correlation with the mean Z values of the right superior temporal gyrus and right medial superior frontal gyrus. CONCLUSION: These results of the altered regional baseline brain function in SAD suggest that the regions with abnormal spontaneous activities are involved in the underlying pathophysiology of SAD patients.