Institute of Psychology, University of Regensburg, Regensburg, Germany.
Neuroimage. 2011 Jun 1;56(3):1556-65. doi: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2011.02.055. Epub 2011 Feb 23.
In patients with central visual field scotomata a large part of visual cortex is not adequately stimulated. Over time this lack of input could lead to a reduction of gray matter in the affected cortical areas. We used Voxel Based Morphometry to investigate structural brain changes in patients with central scotomata due to hereditary retinal dystrophies and compared their results to those of normal sighted subjects. Additionally we correlated clinical and demographic characteristics like duration of disease, scotoma size, visual acuity, fixation stability and reading speed to the amount of gray matter in whole brain analyses within the patient group. We found a decrease in gray matter around the lesion projection zone in visual cortex of patients in comparison to controls. Gray matter loss along the posterior and middle portions of the calcarine sulcus is also correlated with scotoma size, indicating that indeed the lack of functional input provokes the gray matter alterations. In whole brain regression analyses within the patient group we found an additional cluster in the right superior and middle frontal gyri, slightly anterior to the frontal eye fields, where gray matter correlated positively with fixation stability. This could be regarded as a consequence of oculomotor learning.
在存在中心视野缺损的患者中，很大一部分视皮层没有得到充分刺激。随着时间的推移，这种输入不足可能导致受影响的皮质区域的灰质减少。我们使用基于体素的形态计量学方法研究了遗传性视网膜病变导致的中心视野缺损患者的结构性脑变化，并将其结果与正常视力受试者进行了比较。此外，我们还将临床和人口统计学特征（如疾病持续时间、视野缺损大小、视力、固视稳定性和阅读速度）与患者组内全脑分析中的灰质量进行了相关性分析。与对照组相比，我们发现患者视皮层的病变投射区周围灰质减少。沿枕叶和中部距状沟的灰质丢失也与视野缺损大小相关，表明确实缺乏功能输入会引发灰质改变。在患者组内的全脑回归分析中，我们在右侧额上回和中回中发现了另一个簇，位于额眼区的稍前方，此处灰质与固视稳定性呈正相关。这可能被视为眼动学习的结果。
