Robinson Jennifer L, Monkul E Serap, Tordesillas-Gutiérrez Diana, Franklin Crystal, Bearden Carrie E, Fox Peter T, Glahn David C
Department of Psychiatry, University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio, San Antonio, TX, USA.
Psychiatry Res. 2008 Nov 30;164(2):106-13. doi: 10.1016/j.pscychresns.2007.12.004. Epub 2008 Oct 19.
Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) studies of bipolar disorder have revealed fronto-limbic abnormalities in patients during manic and depressive episodes. However, relatively few studies have examined neural activity during euthymia, leaving unanswered questions concerning the impact of mood state on activity in these brain regions. In the present study, we examined 15 remitted bipolar type I patients and 16 demographically matched healthy comparison subjects during performance on an affective face-matching task previously shown to elicit amygdala hyperactivation and prefrontal hypoactivation in manic relative to healthy subjects. In our euthymic sample, amygdala activation did not differ from controls. However, bipolar patients showed hyperactivation in inferior prefrontal cortical regions compared with controls, a finding that contrasts with the hypoactivation previously reported in this region in manic patients. Given the reciprocal relationship between the prefrontal cortex and limbic structures, we propose state-related amygdala activity, similar to that of healthy controls, may be associated with prefrontal hyperactivation when bipolar patients are asymptomatic.
双相情感障碍的功能磁共振成像（fMRI）研究显示，患者在躁狂和抑郁发作期间存在额边缘系统异常。然而，相对较少的研究考察了心境正常期的神经活动，关于情绪状态对这些脑区活动的影响仍存在未解答的问题。在本研究中，我们让15名缓解期的I型双相情感障碍患者和16名人口统计学匹配的健康对照者执行一项情感面孔匹配任务，此前的研究表明，与健康受试者相比，该任务会使躁狂患者的杏仁核过度激活和前额叶激活不足。在我们的心境正常样本中，杏仁核激活与对照组没有差异。然而，与对照组相比，双相情感障碍患者在额下皮质区域表现出过度激活，这一发现与之前报道的躁狂患者该区域激活不足形成对比。鉴于前额叶皮质与边缘系统结构之间的相互关系，我们提出，当双相情感障碍患者无症状时，与健康对照者类似的与状态相关的杏仁核活动可能与前额叶过度激活有关。
