Inner Mongolia Key Laboratory of Pattern Recognition and Intelligent Image Processing, School of Information Engineering, Inner Mongolia University of Science and Technology, China.
Life Sciences Research Center, School of Life Science and Technology, Xidian University, China.
Addict Biol. 2018 Mar;23(2):772-780. doi: 10.1111/adb.12515. Epub 2017 May 5.
With the help of advanced neuroimaging approaches, previous studies revealed structural and functional brain changes in smokers compared with healthy non-smokers. Homotopic resting-state functional connectivity between the corresponding regions in cerebral hemispheres may help us to deduce the changes of functional coordination in the whole brain of young male smokers. Functional homotopy reflects an essential aspect of brain function and communication between the left and right cerebral hemispheres, which is important for the integrity of brain function. However, few studies used voxel mirrored homotopic connectivity (VMHC) method to investigate the changes of homotopic connectivity in young male smokers. Twenty-seven young male smokers and 27 matched healthy male non-smokers were recruited in our study. Compared with healthy male non-smokers, young male smokers showed decreased VMHC values in the insula and putamen, and increased VMHC values in the prefrontal cortex. Correlation analysis demonstrated that there were significant positive correlations between the average VMHC values of the prefrontal cortex and pack-years in young male smokers. In addition, significant negative correlation was found between the average VMHC values in the insula and pack-years. Our results revealed the disrupted homotopic resting-state functional connectivity in young male smokers. The novel findings may extend our understanding of smoking.
借助先进的神经影像学方法,先前的研究揭示了吸烟者与健康非吸烟者之间的大脑结构和功能变化。大脑半球相应区域之间的同型静息态功能连接有助于我们推断出年轻男性吸烟者整个大脑功能协调性的变化。功能同型反映了大脑功能和左右大脑半球之间交流的一个重要方面,这对于大脑功能的完整性很重要。然而,很少有研究使用体素镜像同型连接(VMHC)方法来研究年轻男性吸烟者同型连接的变化。我们的研究招募了 27 名年轻男性吸烟者和 27 名匹配的健康男性非吸烟者。与健康男性非吸烟者相比,年轻男性吸烟者的岛叶和壳核的 VMHC 值降低,而前额叶的 VMHC 值升高。相关性分析表明,年轻男性吸烟者前额叶的平均 VMHC 值与吸烟年数之间存在显著的正相关。此外,还发现岛叶的平均 VMHC 值与吸烟年数之间存在显著的负相关。我们的研究结果揭示了年轻男性吸烟者同型静息态功能连接的破坏。这些新发现可能会扩展我们对吸烟的认识。