Differences In Brain Activity Research Articles

Exposure to community violence as a mechanism linking neighborhood socioeconomic disadvantage and neural responses to reward.

A growing literature links socioeconomic disadvantage and adversity to brain function, including disruptions in reward processing. Less research has examined exposure to community violence (ECV) as a specific adversity related to differences in reward-related brain activation, despite the prevalence of community violence exposure for those living in disadvantaged contexts. The current study tested whether ECV was associated with reward-related ventral striatum (VS) activation after accounting for familial factors associated with differences in reward-related activation (e.g. parenting and family income). Moreover, we tested whether ECV is a mechanism linking socioeconomic disadvantage to reward-related activation in the VS. We utilized data from 444 adolescent twins sampled from birth records and residing in neighborhoods with above-average levels of poverty. ECV was associated with greater reward-related VS activation, and the association remained after accounting for family-level markers of disadvantage. We identified an indirect pathway in which socioeconomic disadvantage predicted greater reward-related activation via greater ECV, over and above family-level adversity. These findings highlight the unique impact of community violence exposure on reward processing and provide a mechanism through which socioeconomic disadvantage may shape brain function.

Brain Function and Pain Interference After Pediatric Intensive Interdisciplinary Pain Treatment.

Intensive interdisciplinary pain treatments (IIPTs) are programs that aim to improve functioning in youth with severe chronic pain. Little is known about how the brain changes after IIPT; however, decreased brain responses to emotional stimuli have been identified previously in pediatric chronic pain relative to healthy controls. We examined whether IIPT increased brain responses to emotional stimuli, and whether this change was associated with a reduction in pain interference. Twenty youths with chronic pain aged 14 to 18 years were scanned using functional magnetic resonance imaging, pre and post-IIPT. During the functional magnetic resonance imaging, patients were presented with emotional stimuli (ie, faces expressing happiness/fear), neutral expressions, and control (ie, scrambled) images. Patients completed a measure of pain interference pre and post-IIPT. Paired t tests were used to examine differences in brain activation in response to emotional versus neutral stimuli, pre to post-IIPT. Data from significant brain clusters were entered into linear mixed models to examine the relationships between brain activation and impairment pre and post-IIPT. Patients demonstrated a decrease in middle frontal gyrus (MFG) activation in response to emotional stimuli (happy + fear) relative to scrambled images, between pre and post-IIPT ( P < 0.05). Lower MFG activation was associated with lower pain interference, pre and post-IIPT ( P < 0.05). Contrary to our hypothesis, IIPT was associated with a reduction in MFG activation to emotional stimuli, and this change was associated with reduced pain interference. The MFG is a highly interconnected brain area involved in both pain chronification and antinociception. With further validation of these results, the MFG may represent an important biomarker for evaluating patient treatment response and target for future pain interventions.

Brain morphological changes and functional neuroanatomy related to cognitive and emotional distractors during working memory maintenance in post-traumatic stress disorder

Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is associated with abnormalities in the processing and regulation of emotion as well as cognitive deficits. This study evaluated the differential brain activation patterns associated with cognitive and emotional distractors during working memory (WM) maintenance for human faces between patients with PTSD and healthy controls (HCs) and assessed the relationship between changes in the activation patterns by the opposing effects of distraction types and gray matter volume (GMV). Twenty-two patients with PTSD and twenty-two HCs underwent T1-weighted magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and event-related functional MRI (fMRI), respectively. Event-related fMRI data were recorded while subjects performed a delayed-response WM task with human face and trauma-related distractors. Compared to the HCs, the patients with PTSD showed significantly reduced GMV of the inferior frontal gyrus (IFG) (p < 0.05, FWE-corrected). For the human face distractor trial, the patients showed significantly decreased activities in the superior frontal gyrus and IFG compared with HCs (p < 0.05, FWE-corrected). The patients showed lower accuracy scores and slower reaction times for the face recognition task with trauma-related distractors compared with HCs as well as significantly increased brain activity in the STG during the trauma-related distractor trial was observed (p < 0.05, FWE-corrected). Such differential brain activation patterns associated with the effects of distraction in PTSD patients may be linked to neural mechanisms associated with impairments in both cognitive control for confusable distractors and the ability to control emotional distraction.

Increased anger and stress and heightened connectivity between IFG and vmPFC in victims during social interaction

Self-identification as a victim of violence may lead to increased negative emotions and stress and thus, may change both structure and function of the underlying neural network(s). In a trans-diagnostic sample of individuals who identified themselves as victims of violence and a matched control group with no prior exposure to violence, we employed a social exclusion paradigm, the Cyberball task, to stimulate the re-experience of stress. Participants were partially excluded in the ball-tossing game without prior knowledge. We analyzed group differences in brain activity and functional connectivity during exclusion versus inclusion in exclusion-related regions. The victim group showed increased anger and stress levels during all conditions. Activation patterns during the task did not differ between groups but an enhanced functional connectivity between the IFG and the right vmPFC distinguished victims from controls during exclusion. This effect was driven by aberrant connectivity in victims during inclusion rather than exclusion, indicating that victimization affects emotional responses and inclusion-related brain connectivity rather than exclusion-related brain activity or connectivity. Victims may respond differently to the social context itself. Enhanced negative emotions and connectivity deviations during social inclusion may depict altered social processing and may thus affect social interactions.

Novel rat model of gaming disorder: assessment of social reward and sex differences in behavior and c-Fos brain activity.

In 2018, the International Classification of Diseases (ICD-11) classified Gaming Disorder (GD) as a mental disorder. GD mainly occurs among adolescents, who, after developing addiction, show psychopathological traits, such as social anxiety, depression, social isolation, and attention deficit. However, the different studies conducted in humans so far show several limitations, such as the lack of demographic heterogeneity and equal representation of age, differences in the type of game and in the follow-up period. Furthermore, at present, no animal models specific to GD are available. To address the lack of an experimental model for GD, in the present work, we proposed a new GD rat model to investigate some peculiar tracts of the disorder. Two-month-old Wistar Kyoto rats, both males and females, were subject to a five-week training with a new innovative touch-screen platform. After five weeks of training, rats were assessed for: (a) their attachment to the play under several conditions, (b) their hyperactivity during gaming, and (c) the maintenance of these conditions after a period of game pause and reward interruption. After sacrifice, using immunohistochemistry techniques, the immunoreactivity of c-Fos (a marker of neuronal activity) was analyzed to study different neural areas. After the training, the rats subjected to GD protocol developed GD-related traits (e.g., hyperactivity, loss control), and the behavioral phenotype was maintained consistently over time. These aspects were completely absent in the control groups. Lastly, the analysis of c-Fos immunoreactivity in prelimbic cortex (PrL), orbitofrontal cortex (OFC), nucleus Accumbens, amygdala and bed nucleus of stria terminalis (BNST) highlighted significant alterations in the GD groups compared to controls, suggesting modifications in neural activity related to the development of the GD phenotype. The proposal of a new GD rat model could represent an innovative tool to investigate, in both sexes, the behavioral and neurobiological features of this disorder, the possible role of external factors in the predisposition and susceptibility and the development of new pharmacological therapies.

Vulnerable at rest? A resting-state EEG study and psychosocial factors of young adult offspring of alcohol-dependent parents

BackgroundOffspring of parents with alcohol use disorder (AUD) are more susceptible to developing AUD, with an estimated heritability of around 50%. Vulnerability to AUD in first-degree relatives is influenced by biological factors, such as spontaneous brain activity, and high-risk psychosocial characteristics. However, existing resting-state EEG studies in AUD offspring have shown inconsistent findings regarding theta, alpha, and beta band frequencies. Additionally, research consistently demonstrates an increased risk of internalizing and externalizing disorders, self-regulation difficulties, and interpersonal issues among AUD offspring. MethodsThis study aimed to investigate the absolute power of theta, alpha, and beta frequencies in young adult offspring with a family history of AUD compared to individuals without family history. The psychosocial profiles of the offspring were also examined in relation to individuals without a family history of AUD. Furthermore, the study sought to explore the potential association between differences in frequency bands and psychosocial variables. Resting-state EEG recordings were obtained from 31 young adult healthy offspring of alcohol-dependent individuals and 43 participants with no family history of AUD (age range: 16–25 years). Participants also completed self-report questionnaires assessing anxiety and depressive symptoms, impulsivity, emotion regulation, and social involvement. ResultsThe results revealed no significant differences in spontaneous brain activity between the offspring and participants without a family history of AUD. However, in terms of psychosocial factors, the offspring exhibited significantly lower social involvement than the control group. ConclusionsThis study does not provide evidence suggesting vulnerability in offspring based on differences in spontaneous brain activity. Moreover, this investigation highlights the importance of interventions aimed at enhancing social connections in offspring. Such interventions can not only reduce the risk of developing AUD, given its strong association with increased feelings of loneliness but also improve the overall well-being of the offspring.

Similarities and differences of dynamic and static spontaneous brain activity between left and right temporal lobe epilepsy.

To comprehensively investigate the potential temporal dynamic and static abnormalities of spontaneous brain activity (SBA) in left temporal lobe epilepsy (LTLE) and right temporal lobe epilepsy (RTLE) and to detect whether these alterations correlate with cognition. Twelve SBA metrics, including ALFF, dALFF, fALFF, dfALFF, ReHo, dReHo, DC, dDC, GSCorr, dGSCorr, VMHC, and dVMHC, in 46 LTLE patients, 43 RTLE patients, and 53 healthy volunteers were compared in the voxel-wise analysis. Correlation analyses between metrics in regions showing statistic differences and epilepsy duration, epilepsy severity, and cognition scores were also performed. Compared with the healthy volunteers, the alteration of SBA was identified both in LTLE and RTLE patients. The ALFF, fALFF, and dALFF values in LTLE, as well as the fALFF values in RTLE, increased in the bilateral thalamus, basal ganglia, mesial temporal lobe, cerebellum, and vermis. Increased dfALFF in the bilateral basal ganglia, increased ReHoanddReHo in the bilateral thalamus in the LTLE group, increased ALFF and dALFF in the pons, and increased ReHoanddReHo in the right hippocampus in the RTLE group were also detected. However, the majority of deactivation clusters were in the ipsilateral lateral temporal lobe. For LTLE, the fALFF, DC, dDC, and GSCorr values in the left lateral temporal lobe and the ReHo and VMHC values in the bilateral lateral temporal lobe all decreased. For RTLE, the ALFF, fALFF, dfALFF, ReHo, dReHo, and DC values in the right lateral temporal lobe and the VMHC values in the bilateral lateral temporal lobe all decreased. Moreover, for both the LTLE and RTLE groups, the dVMHC values decreased in the calcarine cortex. The most significant difference between LTLE and RTLE was the higher activation in the cerebellum of the LTLE group. The alterations of many SBA metrics were correlated with cognition and epilepsy duration. The patterns of change in SBA abnormalities in the LTLE and RTLE patients were generally similar. The integrated application of temporal dynamic and static SBA metrics might aid in the investigation of the propagation and suppression pathways of seizure activity as well as the cognitive impairment mechanisms in TLE.

Potential Neurobiological and clinical markers in Extreme Weight Conditions: from Anorexia to Obesity

AbstractExtreme eating and weight conditions (EWC) are a construct that emerges as a dimensional and theoretical model that identifies individuals who exhibit inappropriate eating behaviours and abrupt weight fluctuations. According to this spectrum of EWC, one extreme can be represented by individuals with anorexia nervosa (AN), characterised by excessive food restriction and an extremely low body mass index (BMI), whereas the other end of this continuum is represented by individuals with obesity (OB), characterised by a BMI above 30. In addition to AN and OB, some eating disorders (EDs), namely bulimia nervosa and binge eating disorder, are also part of this continuum, given the high risk of falling into one of the extremes, especially that of higher BMI. Studies have described similar changes at the psychological and neurobiological levels associated with their abnormal eating patterns, delineating vulnerability pathways related to the neurobiological basis.Based on previous literature, individuals suffering from EWC would show dysfunctional brain activity in regions associated with emotional reward processing and cognitive control compared to healthy controls (HC). Similarly, neuroendocrine alterations in EWC are expected to influence clinical symptomatology. It will also be discussed how impairments in executive function and differential brain activity observed in individuals with EWC may negatively impact their clinical course and treatment outcome.Disclosure of InterestF. Fernandez-Aranda: None Declared, S. Jimenez- Murcia Grant / Research support from: We thank CERCA Programme/Generalitat de Catalunya for institutional support. This research was supported by grants from Instituto de Salud Carlos III (ISCIII) (FIS PI20/00132) and co-funded by FEDER funds/European Regional Development Fund (ERDF), a way to build Europe. CIBERObn is an initiative of ISCIII. Additional support was received from the Delegación del Gobierno para el Plan Nacional sobre Drogas (2021I031) and Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación (grant PID2021-124887OB-I00). Additional funding was received by AGAUR-Generalitat de Catalunya (2021-SGR- 00824), European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under Grant agreement no. 847879 (PRIME/H2020, Prevention and Remediation of Insulin Multimorbidity in Europe) and the European Union’s Horizon Europe research and innovation program under grant agreement No 101080219 (eprObes)., Consultant of: FFA and SJM received consultancy and speakers honoraria from Novo Nordisk.

Differential Brain Activation for Four Emotions in VR-2D and VR-3D Modes.

Similar to traditional imaging, virtual reality (VR) imagery encompasses nonstereoscopic (VR-2D) and stereoscopic (VR-3D) modes. Currently, Russell's emotional model has been extensively studied in traditional 2D and VR-3D modes, but there is limited comparative research between VR-2D and VR-3D modes. In this study, we investigate whether Russell's emotional model exhibits stronger brain activation states in VR-3D mode compared to VR-2D mode. By designing an experiment covering four emotional categories (high arousal-high pleasure (HAHV), high arousal-low pleasure (HALV), low arousal-low pleasure (LALV), and low arousal-high pleasure (LAHV)), EEG signals were collected from 30 healthy undergraduate and graduate students while watching videos in both VR modes. Initially, power spectral density (PSD) computations revealed distinct brain activation patterns in different emotional states across the two modes, with VR-3D videos inducing significantly higher brainwave energy, primarily in the frontal, temporal, and occipital regions. Subsequently, Differential entropy (DE) feature sets, selected via a dual ten-fold cross-validation Support Vector Machine (SVM) classifier, demonstrate satisfactory classification accuracy, particularly superior in the VR-3D mode. The paper subsequently presents a deep learning-based EEG emotion recognition framework, adeptly utilizing the frequency, spatial, and temporal information of EEG data to improve recognition accuracy. The contribution of each individual feature to the prediction probabilities is discussed through machine-learning interpretability based on Shapley values. The study reveals notable differences in brain activation states for identical emotions between the two modes, with VR-3D mode showing more pronounced activation.

Tripolar concentric ring electrodes for capturing localised electroencephalography signals during sleep.

By design, tripolar concentric ring electrodes (TCRE) provide more focal brain activity signals than conventional electroencephalography (EEG) electrodes placed further apart. This study compared spectral characteristics and rates of data loss to noisy epochs with TCRE versus conventional EEG signals recorded during sleep. A total of 20 healthy sleepers (12 females; mean [standard deviation] age 27.8 [9.6] years) underwent a 9-h sleep study. Participants were set up for polysomnography recording with TCRE to assess brain activity from 18 sites and conventional electrodes for EEG, eyes, and muscle movement. A fast Fourier transform using multitaper-based estimation was applied in 5-s epochs to scored sleep. Odds ratios with Bonferroni-adjusted 95% confidence intervals were calculated to determine the proportional differences in the number of noisy epochs between electrode types. Relative power was compared in frequency bands throughout sleep. Linear mixed models showed significant main effects of signal type (p < 0.001) and sleep stage (p < 0.001) on relative spectral power in each power band, with lower relative spectral power across all stages in TCRE versus EEG in alpha, beta, sigma, and theta activity, and greater delta power in all stages. Scalp topography plots showed distinct beta activation in the right parietal lobe with TCRE versus EEG. EEG showed higher rates of noisy epochs compared to TCRE (1.3% versus 0.8%, p < 0.001). TCRE signals showed marked differences in brain activity compared to EEG, consistent with more focal measurements and region-specific differences during sleep. TCRE may be useful for evaluating regional differences in brain activity with reduced muscle artefact compared to conventional EEG.

Re-emergent Tremor in Parkinson's Disease: Evidence of Pathologic β and Prokinetic γ Activity.

Re-emergent tremor is characterized as a continuation of resting tremor and is often highly therapy refractory. This study examines variations in brain activity and oscillatory responses between resting and re-emergent tremors in Parkinson's disease. Forty patients with Parkinson's disease (25 males, mean age, 66.78 ± 5.03 years) and 40 age- and sex-matched healthy controls were included in the study. Electroencephalogram and electromyography signals were simultaneously recorded during resting and re-emergent tremors in levodopa on and off states for patients and mimicked by healthy controls. Brain activity was localized using the beamforming technique, and information flow between sources was estimated using effective connectivity. Cross-frequency coupling was used to assess neuronal oscillations between tremor frequency and canonical frequency oscillations. During levodopa on, differences in brain activity were observed in the premotor cortex and cerebellum in both the patient and control groups. However, Parkinson's disease patients also exhibited additional activity in the primary sensorimotor cortex. On withdrawal of levodopa, different source patterns were observed in the supplementary motor area and basal ganglia area. Additionally, levodopa was found to suppress the strength of connectivity (P < 0.001) between the identified sources and influence the tremor frequency-related coupling, leading to a decrease in β (P < 0.001) and an increase in γ frequency coupling (P < 0.001). Distinct variations in cortical-subcortical brain activity are evident in tremor phenotypes. The primary sensorimotor cortex plays a crucial role in the generation of re-emergent tremor. Moreover, oscillatory neuronal responses in pathological β and prokinetic γ activity are specific to tremor phenotypes. © 2024 The Authors. Movement Disorders published by Wiley Periodicals LLC on behalf of International Parkinson and Movement Disorder Society.

Differences in resting-state brain activity in first-episode drug-naïve major depressive disorder patients with and without suicidal ideation.

Despite altered brain activities being associated with suicidal ideation (SI), the neural correlates of SI in major depressive disorder (MDD) have remained elusive. We enrolled 82 first-episode drug-naïve MDD patients including 41 with SI and 41 without SI, as well as 41 healthy controls (HCs). Resting-state functional and structural MRI data were collected. The measures of fractional amplitude of low-frequency fluctuation (fALFF) and grey matter volume (GMV) were calculated and compared. Compared with HCs, patients with SI exhibited increased fALFF values in the right rectus gyrus and left medial superior frontal gyrus, middle frontal gyrus and precuneus. Decreased GMV in the right parahippocampal gyrus, insula and middle occipital gyrus and increased GMV in the left superior frontal gyrus were detected in patients with SI. In addition, patients without SI demonstrated increased fALFF values in the right superior frontal gyrus and decreased fALFF values in the right postcentral gyrus. Decreased GMV in the left superior frontal gyrus, right medial superior frontal gyrus, opercular part of inferior frontal gyrus, postcentral gyrus, fusiform gyrus and increased left supplementary motor area, superior occipital gyrus, right anterior cingulate gyrus and superior temporal gyrus were revealed in patients with SI. Moreover, in comparison with patients without SI, increased fALFF values were identified in the left precuneus of patients with SI. However, no significant differences were found in GMV between patients with and without SI. These findings might be helpful for finding neuroimaging markers predicting individual suicide risk and detecting targeted brain regions for effective early interventions.

Impact of the day/night cycle on functional connectome in ageing male and female mice

To elucidate how time of day, sex, and age affect functional connectivity (FC) in mice, we aimed to examine whether the mouse functional connectome varied with the day/night cycle and whether it depended on sex and age. We explored C57Bl6/J mice (6♀ and 6♂) at mature age (5 ± 1 months) and middle-age (14 ± 1 months). Each mouse underwent Blood Oxygen-Level-Dependent (BOLD) resting-state functional MRI (rs-fMRI) on a 7T scanner at four different times of the day, two under the light condition and two under the dark condition. Data processing consisted of group independent component analysis (ICA) and region-level analysis using resting-state networks (RSNs) derived from literature. Linear mixed-effect models (LMEM) were used to assess the effects of sex, lighting condition and their interactions for each RSN obtained with group-ICA (RSNs-GICA) and six bilateral RSNs adapted from literature (RSNs-LIT). Our study highlighted new RSNs in mice related to day/night alternation in addition to other networks already reported in the literature. In mature mice, we found sex-related differences in brain activation only in one RSNs-GICA comprising the cortical, hippocampal, midbrain and cerebellar regions of the right hemisphere. In males, brain activity was significantly higher in the left hippocampus, the retrosplenial cortex, the superior colliculus, and the cerebellum regardless of lighting condition; consistent with the role of these structures in memory formation and integration, sleep, and sex-differences in memory processing. Experimental constraints limited the analysis to the impact of light/dark cycle on the RSNs for middle-aged females. We detected significant activation in the pineal gland during the dark condition, a finding in line with the nocturnal activity of this gland. For the analysis of RSNs-LIT, new variables “sexage” (sex and age combined) and “edges” (pairs of RSNs) were introduced. FC was calculated as the Pearson correlation between two RSNs. LMEM revealed no effect of sexage or lighting condition. The FC depended on the edges, but there were no interaction effects between sexage, lighting condition and edges. Interaction effects were detected between i) sex and lighting condition, with higher FC in males under the dark condition, ii) sexage and edges with higher FC in male brain regions related to vision, memory, and motor action. We conclude that time of day and sex should be taken into account when designing, analyzing, and interpreting functional imaging studies in rodents.

Robustness of the self-referential process under normobaric hypoxia: an fNIRS study using the GLM and homologous cortical functional connectivity analyses.

Hypoxia has been reported to impair psychological functions, such as working memory and decision-making. However, few studies have examined hypoxia's effect on social cognition. Using a self-referential task, the present study investigated normobaric hypoxia's effect on the self-referential process. Additionally, we measured brain activity during the task with fNIRS and performed conventional univariate analysis with the general linear model (GLM) as well as homologous cortical functional connectivity analysis. The results revealed that normobaric hypoxia impaired recognition of adjectives in the other-reference condition but not in the self-reference. The GLM analysis did not detect differences in brain activity between the self- and other-reference conditions, suggesting that GLM analysis may not be suitable for examining self- and other-reference conditions' neural correlates. The homologous cortical connectivity analysis revealed that the connectivity's magnitude was greater in the self-reference than in the other-reference conditions in the normoxic group. However, such a decrease in connectivity in the other-reference conditions was not observed in the hypoxic group, possibly to compensate for cognitive decline induced by the hypoxia. Considering that homologous connectivity reflects the default mode network, which is supposedly linked to continuous self-reference, stable strength of the connectivity in the self-reference condition under the hypoxia may suggest robust nature of the self-reference process under normobaric hypoxia.

Reduced reactivity to fear conditioning and pain tests in persons involved in violent video gaming is influenced by adverse childhood experiences.

Video gaming, including violent video gaming, has become very common and lockdown measures of the COVID-19 pandemic even increased the prevalence rates. In this study, we examined if violent video gaming is associated with more adverse childhood experiences (ACE) and if it impairs pain processing and fear conditioning. We tested three groups of participants (violent video gamers, nonviolent video gamers, and non-gamers) and examined fear conditioning as well as pain perception during functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). Violent video gamers displayed significantly higher pain thresholds as well as pain tolerance for electric stimulation, pressure pain stimulation, and cold pressor pain measurements than nonviolent video gamers and non-gamers. This relationship was moderated by adverse childhood experiences, especially physical neglect. Brain images acquired during the fear conditioning fMRI task showed that violent video gamers display significantly less differential brain activation to stimuli signaling pain versus no pain in the anterior cingulate cortex, the juxtapositional lobule cortex, and the paracingulate gyrus compared to non-gamers. There was also a significant negative correlation between adverse childhood experiences and activation in the precuneus and the intracalcarine cortex for signals of pain versus safety. The results of this study imply that violent video gaming is related to reduced processing of pain and signals of pain in a fear learning task, dependent of adverse childhood experiences. These mechanisms need to be examined in more detail and these data could be helpful in preventing the onset and adverse consequences of violent video gaming.

Unlocking the power of motor imagery: a comprehensive review on its application in alleviating foot pain.

Motor imagery is a cognitive process that involves mentally simulating movements without physical execution. It has been studied in the context of foot pain to understand the role of motor cortical reorganization and its impact on motor imagery abilities. However, further research is needed to establish consistent evidence regarding the relationship between motor imagery and foot pain. This review analyzed five relevant articles that investigated motor imagery in the context of foot pain. The studies involved participants with various conditions, including leg amputation, chronic leg pain, complex regional pain syndrome, and Achilles tendinopathy. Different methodologies were employed, including motor cortical mapping, foot laterality recognition tasks, EEG recordings, and treatment interventions incorporating motor imagery. The findings indicated that individuals with leg amputation exhibited functional reorganization in upper limb motor cortical maps, with a breakdown in the inhibitory relationship between foot and hand representations. Participants with chronic leg pain demonstrated slower and less accurate performance on foot laterality recognition tasks compared to healthy controls. Complex regional pain syndrome patients displayed distinct motor imagery strategies and responded differently to first-person and third-person perspectives. EEG studies revealed differences in brain activity during motor imagery tasks under pain-free and pain conditions. Treatment interventions incorporating motor imagery showed promising outcomes in improving functional outcomes and reducing pain levels. Motor imagery plays a significant role in foot pain conditions, although the evidence is still emerging. The findings suggest that motor imagery abilities may be affected by leg amputation, chronic pain, and complex regional pain syndrome. Further research is needed to establish standardized protocols for assessing motor imagery, identify specific patient populations that may benefit most from motor imagery interventions, and explore long-term effects. Integrating motor imagery into clinical practice has the potential to enhance rehabilitation approaches and improve outcomes in foot pain management.

High-Order Temporal Convolutional Network for Improving Classification Performance of SSVEP-EEG

Background and objectiveSteady-state visual evoked potential (SSVEP)-based brain-computer interfaces (BCIs) aim to detect target frequencies corresponding to specific commands in electroencephalographic (EEG) signals by classification algorithms to achieve the desired control. However, SSVEP signals suffer from low signal-to-noise ratio and large differences in brain activity. Moreover, the existing CNN models have small receptive fields, which make it difficult to receive large range of feature information and limit the effectiveness of classification algorithms. MethodsTo this end, we proposed a high-order temporal convolutional neural network (HOT-CNN) model for enhancing the performance of SSVEP target recognition. Specifically, the SSVEP-EEG signals was divided into equal-length time segments and a time-slice attention module was designed to capture the correlation between time slices. The module improves the local characterization of signals and reduces biological noise interference by automatically assigning high weights to locally relevant temporal sampling cues and lower weights to other temporal cues. Moreover, for global features, a temporal convolutional network module was designed to increases the receptive field of the network and to extract more comprehensive time domain features by using dilated causal convolution. Finally, the fusion and analysis of local and global features are achieved by designing a feature fusion and classification module to accomplish accurate classification of SSVEP signals. ResultsOur method was evaluated on large publicly available datasets containing 35 subjects and 40 categories. Experimental results indicated that HOT-CNN achieved encouraging performance compared with other advanced methods: the highest information transfer rate of 241.01bits/min was obtained using 0.5s stimuli, and the highest average accuracy of 96.39% was obtained using 1.0s stimuli. ConclusionsThe method effectively reinforced the global and local time-domain information and improved the classification performance of SSVEP, which has wide application prospects.

The Connection between Neurophysiological Correlates of Trust and Distrust and Isolated HEXACO Dimensions.

Trust and distrust are constructs that have provoked and undergone lots of discussion in the fields of sociology and psychology. However, to our knowledge, there is little agreement about how these constructs should be treated in the future. The present study tries to help in this discussion by re-analyzing prior neurophysiological data highlighting differences between trust and distrust by connecting these data with two distinct personality dimensions. Thus, the objective was to analyze the connection between neurophysiological trust/distrust processing and distinct HEXACO personality dimensions. Differences were found in the event-related potentials (ERPs) calculated for visual presentations of political institution words and brand names, which were evaluated with respect to trust and distrust by button presses. Two time points (330 ms and 780 ms) showed brain activity differences between trust and distrust related to the two word categories at frontal electrode locations. For this study, these findings were taken and connected to HEXACO-60 personality inventory results collected from prior participants. Statistical analysis revealed a significant interaction between the ERPs and two HEXACO personality dimensions concerning trusted brands at the later time point (780 ms) at the right frontal electrode location F8. This result is taken as neurophysiological evidence that parameter values of the personality traits honesty-humility and agreeableness have an influence on brain functions related to trusted brands.

Altered resting-state brain function in endurance athletes.

Previous research has confirmed significant differences in regional brain activity and functional connectivity between endurance athletes and non-athletes. However, no studies have investigated the differences in topological efficiency of the brain functional network between endurance athletes and non-athletes. Here, we compared differences in regional activities, functional connectivity, and topological properties to explore the functional basis associated with endurance training. The results showed significant correlations between Regional Homogeneity in the motor cortex, visual cortex, cerebellum, and the training intensity parameters. Alterations in functional connectivity among the motor cortex, visual cortex, cerebellum, and the inferior frontal gyrus and cingulate gyrus were significantly correlated with training intensity parameters. In addition, the graph theoretical analysis results revealed a significant reduction in global efficiency among athletes. This decline is mainly caused by decreased nodal efficiency and nodal local efficiency of the cerebellar regions. Notably, the sensorimotor regions, such as the precentral gyrus and supplementary motor areas, still exhibit increased nodal efficiency and nodal local efficiency. This study not only confirms the improvement of regional activity in brain regions related to endurance training, but also offers novel insights into the mechanisms through which endurance athletes undergo changes in the topological efficiency of the brain functional network.

Facial emotion processing in patients with borderline personality disorder as compared with healthy controls: an fMRI and ECG study

BackgroundMaladaptive behaviors and interpersonal difficulties in patients with borderline personality disorder (BPD) seem connected to biased facial emotion processing. This bias is often accompanied by heightened amygdala activity in patients with BPD as compared to healthy controls. However, functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) studies exploring differences between patients and healthy controls in facial emotion processing have produced divergent results. The current study explored fMRI and heart rate variability (HRV) correlates of negative facial emotion processing in patients with BPD and healthy controls.MethodsThe study included 30 patients with BPD (29 females; age: M = 24.22, SD = 5.22) and 30 healthy controls (29 females; M = 24.66, SD = 5.28). All participants underwent the “faces” task, an emotional face perception task, in an fMRI session simultaneously with ECG. In this task, participants are presented with emotional expressions of disgust, sadness, and fear (as a negative condition) and with the same pictures in a scrambled version (as a neutral condition).ResultsWe found no differences in brain activity between patients with BPD and healthy controls when processing negative facial expressions as compared to neutral condition. We observed activation in large-scale brain areas in both groups when presented with negative facial expressions as compared to neutral condition. Patients with BPD displayed lower HRV than healthy controls in both conditions. However, there were no significant associations between HRV and amygdala activity and BPD symptoms.ConclusionThe results of this study indicate no abnormal brain activity during emotional facial processing in patients with BPD. This result contrasts with previous studies and more studies are needed to clarify the relationship between facial emotion processing and brain activity in patients with BPD. Possible reasons for the absence of brain activity differences are discussed in the study. Consistent with previous findings, patients showed lower HRV than healthy controls. However, HRV was not associated with amygdala activity and BPD symptoms.