Antonucci Linda A, Pergola Giulio, Passiatore Roberta, Taurisano Paolo, Quarto Tiziana, Dispoto Eleonora, Rampino Antonio, Bertolino Alessandro, Cassibba Rosalinda, Blasi Giuseppe
Section for Neurodiagnostic Applications, Department of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy, Ludwig-Maximilians Universität, 80336, Munich, Germany.
Department of Educational Science, Psychology and Communication Science, University of Bari "Aldo Moro", 70121, Bari, Italy.
Eur Arch Psychiatry Clin Neurosci. 2020 Aug;270(5):553-565. doi: 10.1007/s00406-019-01062-5. Epub 2019 Aug 30.
Previous studies have indicated a link between socio-emotional processing and the oxytocin receptor. In this regard, a single nucleotide polymorphism in the oxytocin receptor coding gene (OXTR rs2268493) has been linked with lower social functioning, increased risk for autism spectrum disorders (ASDs) and with post-mortem OXTR mRNA expression levels. Indeed, the levels of expression of OXTR in brain regions involved in emotion processing are also associated with maternal care. Furthermore, maternal care has been associated with emotional correlates. Taken together, these previous findings suggest a possible combined effect of rs2268493 and maternal care on emotion-related brain phenotypes. A crucial biological mechanism subtending emotional processing is the amygdala-dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) functional connection. On this basis, our aim was to investigate the interaction between rs2268493 and maternal care on amygdala-DLPFC effective connectivity during emotional evaluation. We characterized through dynamic causal modeling (DCM) patterns of amygdala-DLPFC effective connectivity during explicit emotion processing in healthy controls (HC), profiled based on maternal care and rs2268493 genotype. In the whole sample, right top-down DLPFC-to-amygdala pattern was the most likely directional model of effective connectivity. This pattern of connectivity was the most likely for all rs2268493/maternal care subgroups, except for thymine homozygous (TT)/low maternal care individuals. Here, a right bottom-up amygdala-to-DLPFC was the most likely directional model. These results suggest a gene by environment interaction mediated by the oxytocin receptor on biological phenotypes relevant to emotion processing.
先前的研究表明社会情感加工与催产素受体之间存在联系。在这方面，催产素受体编码基因（OXTR rs2268493）中的一个单核苷酸多态性与较低的社会功能、自闭症谱系障碍（ASD）风险增加以及死后OXTR mRNA表达水平有关。事实上，参与情绪加工的脑区中OXTR的表达水平也与母性关怀有关。此外，母性关怀还与情绪相关因素有关。综合来看，这些先前的发现表明rs2268493和母性关怀可能对与情绪相关的脑表型产生联合作用。支持情绪加工的一个关键生物学机制是杏仁核-背外侧前额叶皮质（DLPFC）功能连接。在此基础上，我们的目的是研究rs2268493与母性关怀在情绪评估过程中对杏仁核-DLPFC有效连接性的相互作用。我们通过动态因果模型（DCM）对健康对照（HC）在明确情绪加工过程中杏仁核-DLPFC有效连接性的模式进行了表征，这些健康对照根据母性关怀和rs2268493基因型进行了分类。在整个样本中，右侧自上而下的DLPFC到杏仁核模式是最可能的有效连接方向模型。除了胸腺嘧啶纯合子（TT）/低母性关怀个体外，这种连接模式在所有rs2268493/母性关怀亚组中都是最可能的。在这里，右侧自下而上的杏仁核到DLPFC是最可能的方向模型。这些结果表明，催产素受体介导的基因与环境相互作用对与情绪加工相关的生物学表型产生影响。
