Department of Biomedical Engineering, National Cheng Kung University, Tainan 701, Taiwan.
School of Biomedical Engineering, College of Biomedical Engineering, Taipei Medical University, Taipei, Taiwan.
Neural Plast. 2022 Apr 29;2022:3593262. doi: 10.1155/2022/3593262. eCollection 2022.
Various forms of theta-burst stimulation (TBS) such as intermittent TBS (iTBS) and continuous TBS (cTBS) have been introduced as novel facilitation/suppression schemes during repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS), demonstrating a better efficacy than conventional paradigms. Herein, we extended the rTMS-TBS schemes to electrical stimulation of high-definition montage (HD-TBS) and investigated its neural effects on the human brain.
In a within-subject design, fifteen right-handed healthy adults randomly participated in 10 min and 2 mA HD-TBS sessions: unilateral (Uni)-iTBS, bilateral (Bi)-cTBS/iTBS, and sham stimulation over primary motor cortex regions. A 20-channel near-infrared spectroscopy (NIRS) system was covered on the bilateral prefrontal cortex (PFC), sensory motor cortex (SMC), and parietal lobe (PL) for observing cerebral hemodynamic responses in the resting-state and during fast finger-tapping tasks at pre-, during, and poststimulation. Interhemispheric correlation coefficient (IHCC) and wavelet phase coherence (WPCO) from resting-state NIRS and concentration of oxyhemoglobin during fast finger-tapping tasks were explored to reflect the symmetry between the two hemispheres and cortical activity, respectively.
The IHCC and WPCO of NIRS data in the SMC region under Bi-cTBS/iTBS showed relatively small values at low-frequency bands III (0.06-0.15 Hz) and IV (0.02-0.06), indicating a significant desynchronization in both time and frequency domains. In addition, the SMC activation induced by fast finger-tapping exercise was significantly greater during Uni-iTBS as well as during and post Bi-cTBS/iTBS sessions.
It appears that a 10 min and 2 mA Bi-cTBS/iTBS applied over two hemispheres within the primary motor cortex region could effectively modulate the interhemispheric synchronization and cortical activation in the SMC of healthy subjects. Our study demonstrated that bilateral HD-TBS approaches is an effective noninvasive brain stimulation scheme which could be a novel therapeutic for inducing effects of neuromodulation on various neurological disorders caused by ischemic stroke or traumatic brain injuries.
各种形式的 theta 爆发刺激（TBS），如间歇性 TBS（iTBS）和连续性 TBS（cTBS），已被引入作为重复经颅磁刺激（rTMS）中的新型促进/抑制方案，其效果优于传统模式。在此，我们将 rTMS-TBS 方案扩展到高密度经颅电刺激（HD-TBS），并研究其对人脑的神经效应。
在一项自身对照设计中，15 名右利手健康成年人随机参与了 10 分钟和 2 mA 的 HD-TBS 治疗：单侧（Uni）-iTBS、双侧（Bi）-cTBS/iTBS 和假刺激。一个 20 通道近红外光谱（NIRS）系统覆盖双侧前额叶皮层（PFC）、感觉运动皮层（SMC）和顶叶皮层（PL），以观察静息状态下和刺激前、刺激中和刺激后的快速手指敲击任务期间的脑血流动力学反应。静息状态下 NIRS 的半球间相关系数（IHCC）和小波相位相干性（WPCO）以及快速手指敲击任务期间的氧合血红蛋白浓度分别用于反映两个半球之间的对称性和皮质活动。
Bi-cTBS/iTBS 下 SMC 区域的 NIRS 数据的 IHCC 和 WPCO 在低频带 III（0.06-0.15 Hz）和 IV（0.02-0.06）下表现出较小的值，表明在时间和频率域中都存在明显的去同步。此外，在 Uni-iTBS 以及 Bi-cTBS/iTBS 治疗期间和治疗后，快速手指敲击运动引起的 SMC 激活显著增加。
10 分钟和 2 mA 的 Bi-cTBS/iTBS 应用于初级运动皮层区域的两个半球似乎可以有效地调节健康受试者 SMC 的半球间同步和皮质激活。我们的研究表明，双侧 HD-TBS 方法是一种有效的非侵入性脑刺激方案，可能是一种治疗缺血性中风或创伤性脑损伤引起的各种神经障碍的新型治疗方法。
