Activity In Specific Brain Regions Research Articles

Evaluation of Rural Healing Landscape DESIGN Based on Virtual Reality and Electroencephalography

From the user’s perspective, emotional elements are increasingly being used in design. Researchers have indicated that healing landscapes in rural areas play a positive role in soothing human emotions. In this study, a landscape with healing functions was designed, and 32 subjects experienced emotions in a virtual reality (VR) scene while their 32-channel electroencephalography (EEG) signals were collected. This study compared the brain responses with and without the presence of healing landscape elements and conducted correlation coefficient analysis using eight different regression prediction models to examine the relationship between security, comfort, positivity, and corresponding healing landscape elements. The results show significant improvements in emotions of security, comfort, and positivity post-exposure to the landscape design, especially with certain elements, such as seating, shrubs, and tree pools. EEG data indicate enhanced emotional and cognitive states, particularly relaxation, with increased activity in specific brain regions. The decision tree regression model is the most suitable for our data. It reveals strong correlations between specific healing landscape elements and emotional responses. In the comfort category, “shrubs” show the highest correlation (R² = 0.82), while in the security category, “trees” have the highest correlation (R² = 0.77). Similarly, in the positivity category, “trees” again exhibit the highest correlation (R² = 0.71) with EEG data, indicating their significant impact on these emotional dimensions. This study demonstrates the importance of using scientific methods, such as EEG technology, to validate the principles of emotional design and also underscores the role of green environments in enhancing psychological health and emotional comfort.

A review of functional neuromodulation in humans using low-intensity transcranial focused ultrasound.

Transcranial ultrasonic neuromodulation is a rapidly burgeoning field where low-intensity transcranial focused ultrasound (tFUS), with exquisite spatial resolution and deep tissue penetration, is used to non-invasively activate or suppress neural activity in specific brain regions. Over the past decade, there has been a rapid increase of tFUS neuromodulation studies in healthy humans and subjects with central nervous system (CNS) disease conditions, including a recent surge of clinical investigations in patients. This narrative review summarized the findings of human neuromodulation studies using either tFUS or unfocused transcranial ultrasound (TUS) reported from 2013 to 2023. The studies were categorized into two separate sections: healthy human research and clinical studies. A total of 42 healthy human investigations were reviewed as grouped by targeted brain regions, including various cortical, subcortical, and deep brain areas including the thalamus. For clinical research, a total of 22 articles were reviewed for each studied CNS disease condition, including chronic pain, disorder of consciousness, Alzheimer's disease, Parkinson's disease, depression, schizophrenia, anxiety disorders, substance use disorder, drug-resistant epilepsy, and stroke. Detailed information on subjects/cohorts, target brain regions, sonication parameters, outcome readouts, and stimulatory efficacies were tabulated for each study. In later sections, considerations for planning tFUS neuromodulation in humans were also concisely discussed. With an excellent safety profile to date, the rapid growth of human tFUS research underscores the increasing interest and recognition of its significant potential in the field of non-invasive brain stimulation (NIBS), offering theranostic potential for neurological and psychiatric disease conditions and neuroscientific tools for functional brain mapping.

Differences in prefrontal cortex activation in Chinese college students with different severities of depressive symptoms: A large sample of functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) findings

BackgroundPrevious studies proposed that functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) can be used to distinguish between not only different severities of depressive symptoms but also different subgroups of depression, such as anxious and non-anxious depression, bipolar and unipolar depression, and melancholia and non-melancholia depression. However, the differences in brain haemodynamic activation between depression subgroups (such as confirmed depression [CD] and suspected depression [SD]) with different symptom severities and the possible correlation between symptom severity and haemodynamic activation in specific brain regions using fNIRS have yet to be clarified. MethodsThe severity of depression symptoms was classified using the Hospital Anxiety and Depression scale (HADS) and the Mini International Neuropsychiatric Interview by psychiatrists. We recruited 654 patients with depression who had varying severities of depressive symptoms, including 276 with SD and 378 with CD, and 317 with HCs from among Chinese college students. The 53-channel fNIRS was used to detect the cerebral hemodynamic difference of the three groups during the VFT (verbal fluency task). ResultsCompared with the HC, region-specific fNIRS leads indicate CD patients had significant lower haemodynamic activation in three particular prefrontal regions: 1) right dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC), 2) bilateral frontopolar cortex (FPC), and 3) right Broca's area (BA). SD vs. HC comparisons revealed only significant lower haemodynamic activation in the right FPC area. Compared to SD patients, CD patients exhibited decreased hemodynamic activation changes in the right DLPFC and the right BA. Correlation analysis established a significant negative correlation between the hemodynamic changes in the bilateral FPC and the severity of depressive symptoms. ConclusionsThe right DLPFC and right BA are expected to be physiological mechanisms to distinguish depression subgroups (CD, SD) with different symptom severities. The haemodynamic changes in the bilateral FPC was nagatively associated with the symptom severity of depression.

Update on Non-invasive Brain Stimulation on Stroke Motor Impairment: A Narrative Review.

Stroke is a leading global cause of death and disability, with motor impairment being one of the common post-stroke complications. Rehabilitation is crucial for functional recovery. Recently, non-invasive brain stimulation (NIBS) has emerged as a promising intervention that allows neuromodulation by activating or inhibiting neural activity in specific brain regions. This narrative review aims to examine current research on the effects of various NIBS techniques, including repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation, transcranial direct current stimulation, vagus nerve stimulation, and transcranial focused ultrasound on post-stroke motor function.

High-beta oscillations at EEG resting state and hyperconnectivity of pain circuitry in fibromyalgia: an exploratory cross-sectional study

BackgroundElectroencephalography (EEG) has identified neural activity in specific brain regions as a potential indicator of the neural signature of chronic pain. This study compared the lagged coherence connectivity between regions of interest (ROIs) associated with the pain connectome in women with fibromyalgia (FM) and healthy women (HC).MethodsWe evaluated 64 participants (49 FM and 15 HC) during resting-state EEG sessions under both eyes open (EO) and eyes closed (EC) conditions. In addition to EEG measurements, we assessed clinical and psychological symptoms and serum levels of brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF). The connectivity between eight ROIs was computed across eight different EEG frequencies.ResultsThe FM group demonstrated increased connectivity between the left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) and right anterior cingulate cortex (ACC), specifically in the beta-3 frequency band (t = 3.441, p = 0.044). When comparing the EO and EC conditions, FM patients exhibited heightened interhemispheric connectivity between insular areas (t = 3.372, p = 0.024) and between the left insula (INS) and right DLPFC (t = 3.695, p = 0.024) within the beta-3 frequency band. In the EC condition, there was a negative correlation between pain disability and connectivity in the beta-3 frequency band between the left ACC and the left primary somatosensory cortex (SI; r = −0.442, p = 0.043). In the EO condition, there was a negative correlation between central sensitization severity and lagged coherence connectivity in the alpha-2 frequency band between the right ACC and left SI (r = 0.428, p = 0.014). Moreover, in the EO–EC comparison, the lagged coherence connection between the left DLPFC and right INS, indexed by the gamma frequency band, showed a negative correlation with serum BDNF levels (r = −0.506, p = 0.012).ConclusionThese findings indicate that increased connectivity between different pain processing circuits, particularly in the beta-3 frequency band during rest, may serve as neural biomarkers for the chronic pain brain signature associated with neuroplasticity and the severity of FM symptoms.

A parallel-hierarchical neural network (PHNN) for motor imagery EEG signal classification

Motor imagery brain-computer interfaces (MI-BCIs) play a crucial role in fields such as robot control and stroke rehabilitation. With the flourishing development of deep learning, there has been a continuous emergence of motor imagery deep learning models with higher decoding accuracy. Activation of specific brain regions, such as the motor regions in the frontal and parietal lobes, carries information about motor imagery. However, most studies only extract features from the entire brain region, neglecting the potential features of specific brain regions. This may lead to poorer decoding performance. Therefore, this article proposes a parallel-hierarchical neural network (PHNN), which implements a hierarchical approach to feature learning from brain region level to multi-level fusion. Learning at the brain region level mainly explores the key information of specific brain regions (region-level) and the overall features of the entire brain (global-level), to obtain region-level features (RLF) and global-level features (GLF). Furthermore, given that region-level features contain crucial information within specific brain regions, multi-level fusion is employed to capture and fully utilize the differences and connections between the RLF and GLF, resulting in more discriminative multi-level fusion features (MLFF). We evaluate the model performance on the publicly available BCI Competition IV-2a dataset and High Gamma dataset, achieving recognition accuracies of 84.67% and 94.02%, respectively.

High emotional reactivity is associated with activation of a molecularly distinct hippocampal-amygdala circuit modulated by the glucocorticoid receptor

Emotions are characterized not only by their valence but also by whether they are stable or labile. Yet, we do not understand the molecular or circuit mechanisms that control the dynamic nature of emotional responses. We have shown that glucocorticoid receptor overexpression in the forebrain (GRov) leads to a highly reactive mouse with increased anxiety behavior coupled with greater swings in emotional responses. This phenotype is established early in development and persists into adulthood. However, the neural circuitry mediating this lifelong emotional lability remains unknown. In the present study, optogenetic stimulation in ventral dentate gyrus (vDG) of GRov mice led to a greater range and a prolonged duration of anxiety behavior. cFos expression analysis showed that the amplified behavioral response to vDG activation in GRov mice is coupled to increased neuronal activity in specific brain regions. Relative to wild type mice, GRov mice displayed glutamatergic/GABAergic activation imbalance in ventral CA1 (vCA1) and selectively increased glutamatergic activation in the basal posterior amygdaloid complex. Moreover, forebrain GR overexpression led to increased activation of molecularly distinct subpopulations of neurons within the hippocampus and the posterior basolateral amygdala (pBLA) as evident from the increased cFos co-labeling in the calbindin1+ glutamatergic neurons in vCA1 and in the DARPP-32/Ppp1r1b+ glutamatergic neurons in pBLA. We propose that a molecularly distinct hippocampal-amygdala circuit is shaped by stress early in life and tunes the dynamics of emotional responses.

Dynamic alterations in the amplitude of low-frequency fluctuation in patients with cerebral small vessel disease.

Previous studies have focused on the changes of dynamic and static functional connections in cerebral small vessel disease (CSVD). However, the dynamic characteristics of local brain activity are poorly understood. The purpose of this study was to investigate the dynamic cerebral activity changes in patients with CSVD using the dynamic amplitude of low-frequency fluctuation (d-ALFF). A total of 104 CSVD patients with cognitive impairment (CSVD-CI, n = 52) or normal cognition (CSVD-NC, n = 52) and 63 matched healthy controls (HCs) were included in this study. Every participant underwent magnetic resonance imaging scans and a battery of neuropsychological examinations. The dynamics of spontaneous brain activity were assessed using dynamic changes in the amplitude of low-frequency fluctuation (ALFF) with the sliding-window method. We used voxel-wise one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) to compare dynamic ALFF variability among the three groups. Post-hoc t-tests were used to evaluate differences between each group pair. Finally, the brain regions with d-ALFF values with differences between CSVD subgroups were taken as regions of interest (ROI), and the d-ALFF values corresponding to the ROI were extracted for partial correlation analysis with memory. (1) There was no significant difference in age (p = 0.120), sex (p = 0.673) and education (p = 0.067) among CSVD-CI, CSVD-NC and HC groups, but there were significant differences Prevalence of hypertension and diabetes mellitus among the three groups (p < 10-3). There were significant differences in scores of several neuropsychological scales among the three groups (p < 10-3). (2) ANOVA and post-hoc t-test showed that there were dynamic abnormalities of spontaneous activity in several brain regions in three groups, mainly located in bilateral parahippocampal gyrus and bilateral hippocampus, bilateral insular and frontal lobes, and the static activity abnormalities in bilateral parahippocampal gyrus and bilateral hippocampal regions were observed at the same time, suggesting that bilateral parahippocampal gyrus and bilateral hippocampus may be the key brain regions for cognitive impairment caused by CSVD. (3) The correlation showed that d-ALFF in the bilateral insular was slightly correlated with the Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) score and disease progression rate. The d-ALFF value of the left postcentral gyrus was negatively correlated with the Clock Drawing Test (CDT) score (r = -0.416, p = 0.004), and the d-ALFF value of the right postcentral gyrus was negatively correlated with the Rey's Auditory Verbal Learning Test (RAVLT) word recognition (r = -0.320, p = 0.028). There is a wide range of dynamic abnormalities of spontaneous brain activity in patients with CSVD, in which the abnormalities of this activity in specific brain regions are related to memory and execution or emotion.

Modeling face recognition in the predictive coding framework: A combined computational modeling and functional imaging study

The learning of new facial identities and the recognition of familiar faces are crucial processes for social interactions. Recently, a combined computational modeling and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) study used predictive coding as a biologically plausible framework to model face identity learning and to relate specific model parameters with brain activity (Apps and Tsakiris, Nat Commun 4, 2698, 2013). On the one hand, it was shown that behavioral responses on a two-option face recognition task could be predicted by the level of contextual and facial familiarity in a computational model derived from predictive-coding principles. On the other hand, brain activity in specific brain regions was associated with these parameters. More specifically, brain activity in the superior temporal sulcus (STS) varied with contextual familiarity, whereas activity in the fusiform face area (FFA) covaried with the prediction error parameter that updated facial familiarity.Literature combining fMRI assessments and computational modeling in humans still needs to be expanded. Furthermore, prior results are largely not replicated. The present study was, therefore, specifically set up to replicate these previous findings. Our results support the original findings in two critical aspects. First, on a group level, the behavioral responses were modeled best by the same computational model reported by the original authors. Second, we showed that estimates of these model parameters covary with brain activity in specific, face-sensitive brain regions. Our results thus provide further evidence that the functional properties of the face perception network conform to central principles of predictive coding. However, our study yielded diverging findings on specific computational model parameters reflected in brain activity. On the one hand, we did not find any evidence of a computational involvement of the STS. On the other hand, our results showed that activity in the right FFA was associated with multiple computational model parameters. Our data do not provide evidence for functional segregation between particular face-sensitive brain regions, as previously proposed.

Effect of auricular acupuncture on neuroplasticity of stroke patients with motor dysfunction: A fNIRS study

Cerebral Stroke is an acute cerebrovascular disease, a disease of brain tissue damage caused by the sudden rupture or blockage of blood vessels in the brain that prevents blood flow to the brain. Acupuncture has become a popular treatment for stroke, with auricular acupuncture providing a new idea for stroke treatment. However, the neuromodulatory mechanism of auricular acupuncture in the brain is still unclear. The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of auricular acupuncture in the treatment of upper limb dysfunction and the activation of specific brain regions in stroke patients. Forty patients with stroke hemiplegia who met the nerf criteria were included in the experiment and randomly assigned into two groups (20 patients in each group): the auricular acupuncture group and the control group. Fugl-Meyer score (FMA) assessment of upper limb motor function, motor evoked potential (MEP) measurement, and functional near-infrared brain function imaging (fNIRS) data acquisition in the primary motor M1 area of the brain at rest were performed before and after treatment, respectively. It was found that: 1) after auricular acupuncture treatment, the patients in the auricular acupuncture group showed significantly greater peak MEP and significantly higher oxyhemoglobin content in the M1 region of the brain compared with the control group, with a significant activation effect (MEP: P-value = 0.032, t = -2.22; HbO2; f = 4.225, p = 0.046); 2) in the clinical efficacy assessment, the FMA score in the auricular acupuncture group after treatment (p = 0.0122, t = 2.769). The results suggest that auricular acupuncture has an ameliorative effect on upper limb motor deficits after stroke and that activation of the M1 region of the brain may be a key node in auricular acupuncture for treating upper limb dysfunction in stroke patients, a finding that emphasizes the potential for clinical application of auricular acupuncture therapy for stroke patients with potential mechanisms influencing the outcome.

Neural activation of regions involved in food reward and cognitive control in young females with anorexia nervosa and atypical anorexia nervosa versus healthy controls

Anorexia nervosa (AN) and atypical AN (AtypAN) are complex neurobiological illnesses that typically onset in adolescence with an often treatment-refractory and chronic illness trajectory. Aberrant eating behaviors in this population have been linked to abnormalities in food reward and cognitive control, but prior studies have not examined respective contributions of clinical characteristics and metabolic state. Research is needed to identify specific disruptions and inform novel intervention targets to improve outcomes. Fifty-nine females with AN (n = 34) or AtypAN (n = 25), ages 10–22 years, all ≤90% expected body weight, and 34 age-matched healthy controls (HC) completed a well-established neuroimaging food cue paradigm fasting and after a standardized meal, and we used ANCOVA models to investigate main and interaction effects of Group and Appetitive State on blood oxygenation level-dependent (BOLD) activation for the contrast of exposure to high-calorie food images minus objects. We found main effects of Group with greater BOLD activation in the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (dACC), dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC), hippocampus, caudate, and putamen for AN/AtypAN versus HC groups, and in the three-group model including AN, AtypAN, and HC (sub-)groups, where differences were primarily driven by greater activation in the AtypAN subgroup versus HC group. We found a main effect of Appetitive State with increased premeal BOLD activation in the hypothalamus, amygdala, nucleus accumbens, and caudate for models that included AN/AtypAN and HC groups, and in BOLD activation in the nucleus accumbens for the model that included AN, AtypAN, and HC (sub-)groups. There were no interaction effects of Group with Appetitive State for any of the models. Our findings demonstrate robust feeding-state independent group effects reflecting greater neural activation of specific regions typically associated with reward and cognitive control processing across AN and AtypAN relative to healthy individuals in this food cue paradigm. Differential activation of specific brain regions in response to the passive viewing of high-calorie food images may underlie restrictive eating behavior in this clinical population.

The effect of Parkin gene S/N 167 polymorphism on resting spontaneous brain functional activity in Parkinson's Disease

BackgroundGenetic susceptibility plays a significant role in Parkinson's disease (PD) development. Carriers of the Parkin S/N167 mutation may have an increased risk of PD and altered spontaneous brain activity. ObjectiveThis study aims to investigate the potential pathogenesis of PD through a comparative analysis of the amplitude of low-frequency fluctuations (ALFF) in resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging (rs-fMRI) of subjects with Parkin gene S/N 167 polymorphisms, and to examine the association between spontaneous brain activity and clinical scale scores of PD. MethodsA total of 69 PD patients and 84 healthy controls (HC) were included in the study. Each subject was genotyped for the Parkin gene S/N 167 polymorphism and underwent rs-fMRI scans. ALFF analysis was employed to evaluate the relationship among genotypes, interactive brain regions, and clinical symptoms in PD. ResultsPD patients exhibited decreased ALFF values in the right anterior lobe and vermis of the cerebellum compared to HC. No significant interaction was found between the gene's main effect and the “group × genotype” effect on brain ALFF values. One-factor ANOVA revealed no significant difference in ALFF values between PD subgroups; however, the ALFF values in the right anterior lobe and vermis of the cerebellum were lower in the PD-G and PD-GA groups compared to the HC-G and HC-GA groups. Spearman correlation analysis demonstrated that ALFF values in the PD-GG and PD-GA groups were negatively associated with UPDRS-III scores in the bilateral lingual gyrus (Lingual R/L). ConclusionParkin gene S/N 167 polymorphisms may influence brain functional activity in specific brain regions, and ALFF values are associated with motor symptoms in PD patients.

Instantaneous antidepressant effect of lateral habenula deep brain stimulation in rats studied with functional MRI.

The available treatments for depression have substantial limitations, including low response rates and substantial lag time before a response is achieved. We applied deep brain stimulation (DBS) to the lateral habenula (LHb) of two rat models of depression (Wistar Kyoto rats and lipopolysaccharide-treated rats) and observed an immediate (within seconds to minutes) alleviation of depressive-like symptoms with a high-response rate. Simultaneous functional MRI (fMRI) conducted on the same sets of depressive rats used in behavioral tests revealed DBS-induced activation of multiple regions in afferent and efferent circuitry of the LHb. The activation levels of brain regions connected to the medial LHb (M-LHb) were correlated with the extent of behavioral improvements. Rats with more medial stimulation sites in the LHb exhibited greater antidepressant effects than those with more lateral stimulation sites. These results indicated that the antidromic activation of the limbic system and orthodromic activation of the monoaminergic systems connected to the M-LHb played a critical role in the rapid antidepressant effects of LHb-DBS. This study indicates that M-LHb-DBS might act as a valuable, rapid-acting antidepressant therapeutic strategy for treatment-resistant depression and demonstrates the potential of using fMRI activation of specific brain regions as biomarkers to predict and evaluate antidepressant efficacy.

Acute effects of different exercise forms on executive function and the mechanism of cerebral hemodynamics in hospitalized T2DM patients: a within-subject study.

This study aimed to investigate the acute effects of aerobic exercise (AE), resistance exercise (RE), and integrated concurrent exercise (ICE; i.e., AE plus RE) on executive function among hospitalized type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) inpatients, and the mechanism of cerebral hemodynamics. A within-subject design was applied in 30 hospitalized patients with T2DM aged between 45 and 70 years in the Jiangsu Geriatric Hospital, China. The participants were asked to take AE, RE, and ICE for 3 days at 48-h intervals. Three executive function (EF) tests, namely, Stroop, More-odd shifting, and 2-back tests, were applied at baseline and after each exercise. The functional near-infrared spectroscopy brain function imaging system was used to collect cerebral hemodynamic data. The one-way repeated measurement ANOVA was used to explore training effects on each test indicator. Compared with the baseline data, the EF indicators have been improved after both ICE and RE (p < 0.05). Compared with the AE group, the ICE and RE groups have demonstrated significant improvements in inhibition (ICE: MD = - 162.92 ms; RE: MD = -106.86 ms) and conversion functions (ICE: MD = -111.79 ms; RE: MD = -86.95 ms). Based on the cerebral hemodynamic data, the beta values of brain activation in executive function related brain regions increased after three kinds of exercise, the EF improvements after the ICE showed synchronous activation of blood flow in the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC), the frontal polar (FPA) and orbitofrontal cortex (OFC), the improvement of inhibitory function after RE displayed synchronous activation of DLPFC and FPA, and AE mainly activates DLPFC. The HbO2 concentration in the pars triangularis Broca's area increased significantly after AE, but the EF did not improve significantly. The ICE is preferred for the improvements of executive function in T2DM patients, while AE is more conducive to the improvements of refresh function. Moreover, a synergistic mechanism exists between cognitive function and blood flow activation in specific brain regions.

Ultrasound-induced seizures in a mouse model of KCNQ2-NEO-DEE

PurposeKCNQ2 neonatal developmental and epileptic encephalopathy (NEO-DEE) is characterized by intractable seizures accompanied by an abnormal neurodevelopment. In a mouse model of NEO-DEE carrying the p.(Thr274Met) variant of Kcnq2, spontaneous generalized seizures occur unexpectedly preventing controlled studies and highlighting the necessity for a customized setup to trigger seizures on demand. We aimed to obtain a stable and objective read-out to control the efficacy of new antiepileptic drugs or to test seizure susceptibility. We developed a protocol to trigger ultrasound-induced seizures (UIS) on demand in this model. MethodsWe tested the ability of our protocol to induce seizures at four developmental stages in the Kcnq2p.(Thr274Met/+) mouse model. We mapped the activated brain regions using c-fos protein labeling 2 h after seizure induction. ResultsWe show that the UIS have the same phenotypic expression and the same severity as spontaneous generalized seizures (SGS) in the Kcnq2-NEO-DEE mouse model. The developmental period during which mice exhibit SGS corresponds to the period during which Kcnq2p.(Thr274Met/+) mice are the most susceptible to US. C-fos labeling reveals a subset of 6 brain regions activated 2 h after the induction of the seizure. The same regions were identified in the context of seizure induction in other rodent models. ConclusionThis study provides a non-invasive and easy to use method to induce seizures in a Kcnq2-NEO-DEE mouse model and documents early neuronal activation in specific brain regions. This method can be used to test the efficacy of new antiepileptic approaches for this intractable form of genetic epilepsy.

Comparative study of magnetic resonance imaging-based neuroimaging methods in older adults with depression

BackgroundOlder patients with depression often have accompanying physical diseases, thus, their disease situation is more complex than that of younger people. The medical community has aimed for earlier diagnosis of senile depression due to ineffective treatment and eventual cognitive impairment. MethodNeuroimaging markers of senile depression were identified through the systematic analysis of multimodal data including resting-state functional MRI (rs-fMRI) and structural MRI (sMRI), and compared with clinical neural scales between older participants with and without depression. ResultsMorphological analysis of gray matter by MRI showed significantly enlarged volumes in the left inferior temporal gyrus and right talus fissure, and reduced volumes in the left parahippocampal gyrus and lentiform globus pallidus in the older depression group compared with those in the control group. Comparison of fractional amplitude of low-frequency fluctuation between the groups showed increased partial brain activity in the left posterior central gyrus and right anterior central gyrus in the depression group compared with those in the control group. ConclusionOlder patients with depression showed significant organic changes and significantly increased local brain activity. There was a positive correlation between the intensity of local brain activity in the superior occipital gyrus and the Hamilton Depression Rating Scale scores. Guiding significanceIt is important to assess the organic changes and the degree of brain activity in specific brain regions in the clinical diagnosis of depression in the older adults, to adjust treatment plans early according to the incidence.

Analysis of Altered Brain Dynamics During Episodic Recall and Detection of Generalized Anxiety Disorder

Numerous blood oxygenation level-dependent (BOLD) imaging studies have shown that generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) can lead to abnormal activation of specific brain regions in patients. However, these methods lack sufficient temporal resolution to explain the underlying brain dynamics of GAD. The electroencephalogram (EEG) microstate allows us to explore brain dynamics at the subsecond level. We performed microstate analysis and source localization on the EEG data of 15 GADs and 14 healthy controls (HCs). We found two kinds of noncanonical microstate topologies (MS-4 and MS-5) in the episodic recall tasks. Compared with HCs, the duration and coverage of MS-5 were significantly reduced in GADs and positively correlated with the GAD-7 scores. The results of source localization showed obvious activation in the prefrontal lobe, parietal lobe, temporal lobe, and fusiform gyri. Moreover, we propose an improved capsule network to capture EEG spatial features and combine them with temporal parameters of microstates for more reliable GAD detection. The sensor-level EEG data and the source-level EEG data obtained by source reconstruction are used as input to the model. The optimal configuration combined the spatial features of source-level data with microstate features and achieved the highest classification accuracy. Collectively, the statistical results indicated remarkable differences in dynamic brain parameters between the two groups, and patients with GAD may have abnormalities in their higher sensory cortex that affect the processing of anxiety signals. Furthermore, our proposed fusion framework provides a reliable method for GAD automatic detection.

Repetitive Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation of the Brain Region Activated by Motor Imagery Involving a Paretic Wrist and Hand for Upper-Extremity Motor Improvement in Severe Stroke: A Preliminary Study.

Approximately two-thirds of stroke survivors experience chronic upper-limb paresis; however, treatment options are limited. Repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) can enhance motor function recovery in stroke survivors, but its efficacy is controversial. We compared the efficacy of stimulating different targets in 10 chronic stroke patients with severe upper-limb motor impairment. Motor imagery-based brain-computer interface training augmented with virtual reality was used to induce neural activity in the brain region during an imagery task. Participants were then randomly assigned to two groups: an experimental group (received high-frequency rTMS delivered to the brain region activated earlier) and a comparison group (received low-frequency rTMS delivered to the contralesional primary motor cortex). Behavioural metrics and diffusion tensor imaging were compared pre- and post rTMS. After the intervention, participants in both groups improved somewhat. This preliminary study indicates that in chronic stroke patients with severe upper-limb motor impairment, inducing activation in specific brain regions during motor imagery tasks and selecting these regions as a target is feasible. Further studies are needed to explore the efficacy of this intervention.

Stress-induced reduction of Na+/H+ exchanger isoform 1 promotes maladaptation of neuroplasticity and exacerbates depressive behaviors.

Major depression disorder (MDD) is a neuropsychiatric disorder characterized by abnormal neuronal activity in specific brain regions. A factor that is crucial in maintaining normal neuronal functioning is intracellular pH (pHi) homeostasis. In this study, we show that chronic stress, which induces depression-like behaviors in animal models, down-regulates the expression of the hippocampal Na+/H+ exchanger isoform 1, NHE1, a major determinant of pHi in neurons. Knockdown of NHE1 in CA1 hippocampal pyramidal neurons leads to intracellular acidification, promotes dendritic spine loss, lowers excitatory synaptic transmission, and enhances the susceptibility to stress exposure in rats. Moreover, E3 ubiquitin ligase cullin4A may promote ubiquitination and degradation of NHE1 to induce these effects of an unbalanced pHi on synaptic processes. Electrophysiological data further suggest that the abnormal excitability of hippocampal neurons caused by maladaptation of neuroplasticity may be involved in the pathogenesis of this disease. These findings elucidate a mechanism for pHi homeostasis alteration as related to MDD.

Effects of chronic caffeine intake and withdrawal on neural activity assessed via resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging in mice

Caffeine is a psychoactive substance that not only improves wakefulness, but also slows the cognitive decline caused by aging. However, at present, there are no reports about the effects of caffeine withdrawal, including headaches and changes in brain functional networks (nerve activity). Headache may occur approximately 24 h after discontinuing caffeine intake in chronic caffeine drinkers.The current study aimed to examine the brain functional activity via resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging in chronically caffeinated and decaffeinated groups to investigate changes in brain activity caused by caffeine.C57BL/6J mice were included in the analysis, and they underwent 9.4-T ultrahigh-field magnetic resonance imaging. The mice were classified into the control, chronic caffeinated, and caffeine withdrawal grsoups. Mice were divided into three groups: 1) not exposed to caffeine (control); 2) treated with caffeine at a concentration of 0.3 mg/mL for 4 weeks (chronic caffeinated); and 3) treated as before with caffeine and withdrawn from caffeine for 24 h. After the three groups were examined, functional connectivity matrices were calculated using brain imaging analysis tools, and independent component analysis was performed.The results showed that caffeine administration activated neural activity areas in the stress response system. Furthermore, 24h after caffeine withdrawal, the results showed an increase in pain-related neural activity. In addition, caffeine administration was shown to activate the dentate gyrus, one of the hippocampal regions, and to decrease the neural activity in the olfactory bulb and anterior cingulate cortex.In the current research, the neural activity of specific brain regions changed after chronic caffeine administration and withdrawal.