División de Neurociencia, Centro de Investigación en Complejidad Social (neuroCICS), Universidad del Desarrollo, Av. Las Condes 12461, Las Condes, Santiago, 7590943, Chile.
Unidad de Imágenes Cuantitativas Avanzadas, Departamento de Imágenes, Clínica Alemana de Santiago, Av. Vitacura 5951, Vitacura, 7650568, Chile.
Sci Rep. 2017 Oct 30;7(1):14328. doi: 10.1038/s41598-017-14744-8.
A dysfunction in the excitatory-inhibitory (E/I) coordination in neuronal assembly has been proposed as a possible neurobiological mechanism of Autistic Spectrum Disorder (ASD). However, the potential impact of this mechanism in cognitive performance is not fully explored. Since the main consequence of E/I dysfunction is an impairment in oscillatory activity and its underlying cognitive computations, we assessed the electroencephalographic activity of ASD and typically developing (TD) subjects during a working-memory task. We found that ASD subjects committed more errors than TD subjects. Moreover, TD subjects demonstrated a parametric modulation in the power of alpha and theta band while ASD subjects did not demonstrate significant modulations. The preceding leads to significant differences between the groups in both the alpha power placed on the occipital cortex and the theta power placed on the left premotor and the right prefrontal cortex. The impaired theta modulation correlated with autistic symptoms. The results indicated that ASD may present an alteration in the recruitment of the oscillatory activity during working-memory, and this alteration could be related to the physiopathology of the disorder.
神经元集合中兴奋抑制（E/I）协调失调被认为是自闭症谱系障碍（ASD）的一种潜在神经生物学机制。然而，这种机制对认知表现的潜在影响尚未得到充分探索。由于 E/I 功能障碍的主要后果是振荡活动及其潜在的认知计算受损，我们在工作记忆任务中评估了 ASD 和典型发育（TD）受试者的脑电图活动。我们发现 ASD 受试者比 TD 受试者犯了更多的错误。此外，TD 受试者在α和θ波段的功率表现出参数调制，而 ASD 受试者则没有表现出明显的调制。这导致了两组之间在枕叶皮层的α功率和左侧运动前皮层和右侧前额叶皮层的θ功率上的显著差异。受损的θ调制与自闭症症状相关。结果表明，ASD 在工作记忆过程中可能会出现振荡活动的募集改变，这种改变可能与该疾病的病理生理学有关。
