Motzkin Julian C, Philippi Carissa L, Oler Jonathan A, Kalin Ned H, Baskaya Mustafa K, Koenigs Michael
Department of Psychiatry, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, WI, USA; Neuroscience Training Program, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, WI, USA; Medical Scientist Training Program, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, WI, USA.
Department of Psychiatry, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, WI, USA.
Cortex. 2015 Mar;64:281-8. doi: 10.1016/j.cortex.2014.11.013. Epub 2014 Dec 13.
The ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC) plays a key role in modulating emotional responses, yet the precise neural mechanisms underlying this function remain unclear. vmPFC interacts with a number of subcortical structures involved in affective processing, including the amygdala, hypothalamus, periaqueductal gray, ventral striatum, and bed nucleus of stria terminalis (BNST). While a previous study of non-human primates shows that vmPFC lesions reduce BNST activity and anxious behavior, no such causal evidence exists in humans. In this study, we used a novel application of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) in neurosurgical patients with focal, bilateral vmPFC damage to determine whether vmPFC is indeed critical for modulating BNST function in humans. Relative to neurologically healthy subjects, who exhibited robust rest-state functional connectivity between vmPFC and BNST, the vmPFC lesion patients had significantly lower resting-state perfusion of the right BNST. No such perfusion differences were observed for the amygdala, striatum, hypothalamus, or periaqueductal gray. This study thus provides unique data on the relationship between vmPFC and BNST, suggesting that vmPFC serves to promote BNST activity in humans. This finding is relevant for neural circuitry models of mood and anxiety disorders.
腹内侧前额叶皮层（vmPFC）在调节情绪反应中起关键作用，但其功能背后的确切神经机制仍不清楚。vmPFC与许多参与情感处理的皮层下结构相互作用，包括杏仁核、下丘脑、导水管周围灰质、腹侧纹状体和终纹床核（BNST）。虽然之前对非人类灵长类动物的研究表明，vmPFC损伤会降低BNST活动和焦虑行为，但在人类中尚无此类因果证据。在本研究中，我们对患有局灶性双侧vmPFC损伤的神经外科患者采用了一种新的磁共振成像（MRI）应用，以确定vmPFC在调节人类BNST功能方面是否确实至关重要。相对于在vmPFC和BNST之间表现出强大静息态功能连接的神经健康受试者，vmPFC损伤患者右侧BNST的静息态灌注显著降低。在杏仁核、纹状体、下丘脑或导水管周围灰质中未观察到此类灌注差异。因此，本研究提供了关于vmPFC和BNST之间关系的独特数据，表明vmPFC在人类中有助于促进BNST活动。这一发现与情绪和焦虑障碍的神经回路模型相关。
