Department of Radiology, German Cancer Research Center, Heidelberg, Germany; Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Center for Psychosocial Medicine, University of Heidelberg, Heidelberg, Germany.
Department of Radiology, German Cancer Research Center, Heidelberg, Germany; Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Center for Psychosocial Medicine, University of Heidelberg, Heidelberg, Germany.
Psychiatry Res. 2015 Oct 30;234(1):15-24. doi: 10.1016/j.pscychresns.2015.06.011. Epub 2015 Aug 22.
Symptomatology and behavioral characteristics in autism spectrum disorders (ASD) have increasingly been linked to abnormalities in early brain growth patterns of affected children. Studies investigating specific components of gray matter structure, such as cortical thickness (CT), have produced conflicting results, and have rarely included additional measures of social impairment. In the present study, we applied a surface-based whole brain analysis to investigate CT in a sample of 36 pre-adolescent children [18 subjects with ASD (IQ mean: 111) and 18 healthy controls (IQ mean: 112.8), age range 6-12 years]. The CT analysis revealed widespread, but mostly left-hemispheric thinning in frontal, temporal, parietal and occipital brain areas related to the theory-of-mind network and the heteromodal association cortex. In an exploratory analysis, CT was observed to be differently associated with social impairment in children with ASD compared with typically developing children. The affected neuroanatomical regions are related to characteristic deficits in language, cognition and behavior that are often observed in the disorder. The relationship between social impairment and CT in children with ASD and controls seems to indicate aberrant developmental trajectories in ASD emerging early in life.
自闭症谱系障碍（ASD）的症状学和行为特征与受影响儿童早期大脑生长模式的异常越来越相关。研究调查了灰质结构的特定成分，如皮质厚度（CT），但结果相互矛盾，并且很少包括社交障碍的其他衡量标准。在本研究中，我们应用了基于表面的全脑分析，对 36 名青春期前儿童（18 名自闭症谱系障碍患者（智商平均值：111）和 18 名健康对照组（智商平均值：112.8），年龄范围 6-12 岁）的 CT 进行了研究。CT 分析显示，与心理理论网络和异模态联合皮层相关的额、颞、顶和枕叶大脑区域存在广泛的、但主要是左侧的变薄现象。在一项探索性分析中，观察到自闭症谱系障碍儿童的 CT 与社交障碍的关联与典型发育儿童不同。受影响的神经解剖区域与该疾病中经常观察到的语言、认知和行为的特征缺陷有关。自闭症谱系障碍儿童和对照组的社交障碍与 CT 之间的关系似乎表明自闭症谱系障碍在生命早期就出现了异常的发育轨迹。
