Institute for Human Neuroscience, Boys Town National Research Hospital, Boys Town, NE, USA; Department of Pharmacology & Experimental Neuroscience, University of Nebraska Medical Center, Omaha, NE, USA.
Institute for Human Neuroscience, Boys Town National Research Hospital, Boys Town, NE, USA.
Neuroimage. 2021 Dec 1;244:118552. doi: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2021.118552. Epub 2021 Sep 10.
While numerous studies have examined the developmental trajectory of task-based neural oscillations during childhood and adolescence, far less is known about the evolution of spontaneous cortical activity during this time period. Likewise, many studies have shown robust sex differences in task-based oscillations during this developmental period, but whether such sex differences extend to spontaneous activity is not understood.
Herein, we examined spontaneous cortical activity in 111 typically-developing youth (ages 9-15 years; 55 male). Participants completed a resting state magnetoencephalographic (MEG) recording and a structural MRI. MEG data were source imaged and the power within five canonical frequency bands (delta, theta, alpha, beta, gamma) was computed. The resulting power spectral density maps were analyzed via vertex-wise ANCOVAs to identify spatially-specific effects of age, sex, and their interaction.
We found robust increases in power with age in all frequencies except delta, which decreased over time, with findings largely confined to frontal cortices. Sex effects were distributed across frontal and temporal regions; females tended to have greater delta and beta power, whereas males had greater alpha. Importantly, there was a significant age-by-sex interaction in theta power, such that males exhibited decreasing power with age while females showed increasing power with age in the bilateral superior temporal cortices.
These data suggest that the strength of spontaneous activity undergoes robust change during the transition from childhood to adolescence (i.e., puberty onset), with intriguing sex differences in some cortical areas. Future developmental studies should probe task-related oscillations and spontaneous activity in parallel.
虽然有许多研究已经考察了儿童和青少年时期基于任务的神经振荡的发展轨迹，但在此期间自发皮质活动的演变却知之甚少。同样，许多研究表明，在这一发育时期，基于任务的振荡存在明显的性别差异，但这种性别差异是否延伸到自发活动尚不清楚。
在此，我们检查了 111 名正常发育的青少年（9-15 岁；55 名男性）的自发皮质活动。参与者完成了静息状态磁共振脑磁图（MEG）记录和结构 MRI。MEG 数据进行源成像，计算五个典型频率带（δ、θ、α、β、γ）内的功率。通过顶点-wise ANCOVA 分析所得功率谱密度图，以识别年龄、性别及其相互作用的空间特异性影响。
我们发现，除了随时间下降的δ频段外，所有频段的功率都随着年龄的增长而显著增加，发现主要局限于额皮质。性别效应分布于额区和颞区；女性倾向于具有更大的δ和β功率，而男性具有更大的α。重要的是，θ功率存在显著的年龄-性别交互作用，即男性随着年龄的增长而呈现出功率下降，而女性随着年龄的增长在双侧颞上皮质呈现出功率增加。
这些数据表明，自发活动的强度在从儿童到青少年（即青春期开始）的过渡期间发生了显著变化，在某些皮质区域存在有趣的性别差异。未来的发展研究应并行探究与任务相关的振荡和自发活动。
