Study of intrinsic functional connectivity from medial prefrontal cortex in female with major depressive disorders

Abstract

Major depressive disorder (MDD) is associated with excessive self-focus and a tendency to engage in self-reflection. Women are more inclined to form negative thoughts when facing problems such as social rejection. The neuroimaging studies addressing MDD females are still rare. The medial prefrontal cortex, a central node of anterior default mode network (DMN), plays an important role in the pathophysiology of MDD. In this study, we explored the inter-regional correlation feature of mPFC with whole brain through functional connectivity (FC) analysis of resting state functional magnetic resonance imaging (rs-fMRI) data. Increased FC with left anterior cingulate cortex (ACC_L) was found in female MDD patients compared with healthy controls. Furthermore, the FC strength of ACC_L was positively correlated with clinical scores, which implied the important role of mPFC-ACC pathway in MDD females. Moreover, decreased FC with right middle temporal gyrus (mTG_R) and left middle temporal gyrus (mTG_L) was found in MDD females, which may result from the low self-evaluation in MDD. This work provides additional insights in understanding the pathophysiological mechanisms of MDD women.