Department of Andrology, Nanjing Drum Tower Hospital, The Affiliated Hospital of Nanjing University Medical School, Nanjing, China.
Department of Psychiatry, Nanjing Brain Hospital, The Affiliated Hospital of Nanjing Medical University, Nanjing, China.
Andrology. 2017 Nov;5(6):1073-1081. doi: 10.1111/andr.12411. Epub 2017 Oct 26.
Various neuroimaging studies had identified changes of cerebral activity and structures during the processes of sexual arousal. The identified brain regions were also believed to regulate emotional and cognitive processes. Yet, little was known about the neural mechanisms underlying psychogenic erectile dysfunction. Moreover, brain mechanisms mediating the processing of sexual arousal by these psychological processes were unclear. To investigate this issue, graph theory was applied to evaluate the topological properties of functional brain networks among 24 psychogenic erectile dysfunction patients and 26 healthy controls. Abnormal metrics and correlations with clinical characteristics were further analyzed. Our results showed that psychogenic erectile dysfunction had higher small-worldness and more modules. Furthermore, psychogenic erectile dysfunction showed altered path length and strength of the right superior frontal gyrus (dorsolateral), superior parietal gyrus, parahippocampal gyrus and left temporal pole (superior temporal gyrus), post-central gyrus, mainly located in the cognitive control and emotional regulation subnetworks. And the altered parameters of the small-worldness and right parahippocampal gyrus were related to the clinical characteristics of psychogenic erectile dysfunction. Together, our results suggested that psychogenic erectile dysfunction was associated with disruptions in the topological structure of functional brain subnetworks underlying the cognitive and emotional processes.
多项神经影像学研究已经确定了性唤起过程中大脑活动和结构的变化。被识别出的大脑区域也被认为可以调节情绪和认知过程。然而，对于心理过程引起的勃起功能障碍的神经机制知之甚少。此外，这些心理过程介导性唤起处理的大脑机制尚不清楚。为了研究这个问题，我们应用图论来评估 24 名心理性勃起功能障碍患者和 26 名健康对照者的功能性大脑网络的拓扑特性。进一步分析了异常指标与临床特征的相关性。我们的研究结果表明，心理性勃起功能障碍具有更高的小世界特性和更多的模块。此外，心理性勃起功能障碍表现出右侧额上回（背外侧）、顶上回、海马旁回和左侧颞极（颞上回）、后中央回的路径长度和强度改变，主要位于认知控制和情绪调节子网中。并且小世界特性和右侧海马旁回的改变参数与心理性勃起功能障碍的临床特征有关。总之，我们的研究结果表明，心理性勃起功能障碍与认知和情绪过程相关的功能性大脑子网的拓扑结构破坏有关。
