Abstract
Tourette syndrome (TS) is a childhood-onset chronic disorder characterized by the presence of multiple motor and vocal tics. This study investigated the alterations of spontaneous brain activities in children with TS by resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging (rs-fMRI). We obtained rs-fMRI scans from 21 drug-naïve and pure TS children and 29 demographically matched healthy children. The amplitude of low-frequency fluctuation (ALFF), fractional ALFF (fALFF) and regional homogeneity (ReHo) of rs-fMRI data were calculated to measure spontaneous brain activity. We found significant alterations of ALFF or fALFF in vision-related structures including the calcarine sulcus, the cuneus, the fusiform gyrus, and the left insula in TS children. Decreased ReHo was found in the right cerebellum. Further analysis showed that the ReHo value of the right cerebellum was positively correlated with TS duration. Our study provides empirical evidence for abnormal spontaneous neuronal activity in TS patients, which may implicate the neurophysiological mechanism in TS children. Moreover, the right cerebellum can be potentially used as a biomarker for the pathophysiology of early TS in children.
Highlights
As is well known, an aberrant distribution of interneurons in the cortico–striato–thalamo–cortical (CSTC) circuit was found in Tourette syndrome (TS) patients[4,5,6,7]
We hypothesized that 1) significant differences of Amplitude of low frequency fluctuations (ALFF)/fractional ALFF (fALFF) and regional homogeneity (ReHo) values would be detected within specific brain regions between normal controls and TS children; and 2) the alterations of the spontaneous brain activity would be related to tic severity scores or tic duration in TS children
All subjects used in this study were without attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) or obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD)
Summary
An aberrant distribution of interneurons in the cortico–striato–thalamo–cortical (CSTC) circuit was found in TS patients[4,5,6,7]. TS patients show a decrease of the white matter volume in the right frontal pole as well as significantly increased axial diffusivity and mean diffusivity in the right cingulum bundle projecting to the cingulate gyrus These structural changes were found to be significantly correlated with tic severity and duration[10, 11]. They found a decrease of fractional anisotropy and an increase of radial diffusivity in the deep white matter tracts of the CSTC circuit and superficial white matter of the primary motor and somatosensory cortex, commissural and association fibers[12]. We hypothesized that 1) significant differences of ALFF/fALFF and ReHo values would be detected within specific brain regions between normal controls and TS children; and 2) the alterations of the spontaneous brain activity would be related to tic severity scores or tic duration in TS children
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