Department of Radiology, Tangdu Hospital, The Fourth Military Medical University, Xi'an, China.
PLoS One. 2013;8(3):e58098. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0058098. Epub 2013 Mar 6.
The formation of compulsive pattern of drug use is related to abnormal regional neural activity and functional reorganization in the heroin addicts' brain, but the relationship between heroin-use-induced disrupted local neural activity and its functional organization pattern in resting-state is unknown.
METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: With fMRI data acquired during resting state from 17 male heroin dependent individuals (HD) and 15 matched normal controls (NC), we analyzed the changes of amplitude of low frequency fluctuation (ALFF) in brain areas, and its relationship with history of heroin use. Then we investigated the addiction related alteration in functional connectivity of the brain regions with changed ALFF using seed-based correlation analysis. Compared with NC, the ALFF of HD was obviously decreased in the right caudate, right dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (dACC), right superior medial frontal cortex and increased in the bilateral cerebellum, left superior temporal gyrus and left superior occipital gyrus. Of the six regions, only the ALFF value of right caudate had a negative correlation with heroin use. Setting the six regions as "seeds", we found the functional connectivity between the right caudate and dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (dlPFC) was reduced but that between the right caudate and cerebellum was enhanced. Besides, an abnormal lateral PFC-dACC connection was also observed in HD.
The observations of dysfunction of fronto-striatal and fronto-cerebellar circuit in HD implicate an altered balance between local neuronal assemblies activity and their integrated network organization pattern which may be involved in the process from voluntary to habitual and compulsive drug use.
强迫性药物使用模式的形成与海洛因成瘾者大脑中异常的区域神经活动和功能重组有关，但海洛因引起的局部神经活动紊乱与其静息状态下的功能组织模式之间的关系尚不清楚。
方法/主要发现：我们对 17 名男性海洛因依赖者（HD）和 15 名匹配的正常对照组（NC）在静息状态下采集的 fMRI 数据进行了分析，以研究脑区低频振幅（ALFF）的变化及其与海洛因使用史的关系。然后，我们使用基于种子的相关分析，研究了与成瘾相关的脑区功能连接的改变。与 NC 相比，HD 的右侧尾状核、右侧背侧前扣带皮层（dACC）、右侧上内侧额皮质的 ALFF 明显降低，双侧小脑、左侧颞上回和左侧顶叶上回的 ALFF 明显升高。在这六个区域中，只有右侧尾状核的 ALFF 值与海洛因使用呈负相关。以这六个区域为“种子”，我们发现右侧尾状核与背外侧前额叶（dlPFC）之间的功能连接减少，而右侧尾状核与小脑之间的功能连接增强。此外，HD 还观察到外侧前额叶-前扣带连接异常。
HD 中额纹状体和额小脑回路功能障碍的观察提示，局部神经元集合活动及其整合网络组织模式之间的平衡发生改变，这可能与从自愿使用到习惯性和强迫性使用药物的过程有关。
