异常的有效连接在弱视的立体视缺陷中起基础性作用。
Abnormal effective connectivity in visual cortices underlies stereopsis defects in amblyopia.
机构信息
Department of Optometry and Visual Science, West China Hospital, Sichuan University, Chengdu, China.
Department of Optometry and Visual Science, West China Hospital, Sichuan University, Chengdu, China; Department of Ophthalmology, West China Hospital, Sichuan University, Chengdu, China.
出版信息
Neuroimage Clin. 2022;34:103005. doi: 10.1016/j.nicl.2022.103005. Epub 2022 Apr 8.
The neural basis underlying stereopsis defects in patients with amblyopia remains unclear, which hinders the development of clinical therapy. This study aimed to investigate visual network abnormalities in patients with amblyopia and their associations with stereopsis function. Spectral dynamic causal modeling methods were employed for resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging data to investigate the effective connectivity (EC) among 14 predefined regions of interest in the dorsal and ventral visual pathways. We adopted two independent datasets, including a cross-sectional and a longitudinal dataset. In the cross-sectional dataset, we compared group differences in EC between 31 patients with amblyopia (mean age: 26.39 years old) and 31 healthy controls (mean age: 25.71 years old) and investigated the association between EC and stereoacuity. In addition, we explored EC changes after perceptual learning in a novel longitudinal dataset including 9 patients with amblyopia (mean age: 15.78 years old). We found consistent evidence from the two datasets indicating that the aberrant EC from V2v to LO2 is crucial for the stereoscopic deficits in the patients with amblyopia: it was weaker in the patients than in the controls, showed a positive linear relationship with the stereoscopic function, and increased after perceptual learning in the patients. In addition, higher-level dorsal (V3d, V3A, and V3B) and ventral areas (LO1 and LO2) were important nodes in the network of abnormal ECs associated with stereoscopic deficits in the patients with amblyopia. Our research provides insights into the neural mechanism underlying stereopsis deficits in patients with amblyopia and provides candidate targets for focused stimulus interventions to enhance the efficacy of clinical treatment for the improvement of stereopsis deficiency.
立体视缺陷在弱视患者中的神经基础尚不清楚,这阻碍了临床治疗的发展。本研究旨在探讨弱视患者的视觉网络异常及其与立体视功能的关系。采用谱动态因果建模方法对静息态功能磁共振成像数据进行分析,以研究背侧和腹侧视觉通路中 14 个预先定义的感兴趣区之间的有效连接(EC)。我们采用了两个独立的数据集,包括横断面数据集和纵向数据集。在横断面数据集中,我们比较了 31 名弱视患者(平均年龄:26.39 岁)和 31 名健康对照者(平均年龄:25.71 岁)之间 EC 的组间差异,并探讨了 EC 与立体锐度之间的关系。此外,我们在一个新的纵向数据集中探索了知觉学习后 EC 的变化,该数据集包括 9 名弱视患者(平均年龄:15.78 岁)。我们从两个数据集都得到了一致的证据,表明 V2v 到 LO2 的异常 EC 对弱视患者的立体视缺陷至关重要:与对照组相比,弱视患者的 EC 较弱,与立体视功能呈正线性关系,并且在患者的知觉学习后增加。此外,较高水平的背侧(V3d、V3A 和 V3B)和腹侧区域(LO1 和 LO2)是与弱视患者立体视缺陷相关的异常 EC 网络中的重要节点。我们的研究为弱视患者立体视缺陷的神经机制提供了新的认识,并为有针对性的刺激干预提供了候选靶点,以提高临床治疗的效果,改善立体视缺陷。