Center for Machine Vision and Signal Analysis, University of Oulu, 90014, Oulu, Finland.
Oulu Functional NeuroImaging, Research Unit of Health Science and Technology, University of Oulu, 90029, Oulu, Finland.
Sci Rep. 2023 Mar 30;13(1):5222. doi: 10.1038/s41598-023-32271-7.
Respiratory brain pulsations pertaining to intra-axial hydrodynamic solute transport are markedly altered in focal epilepsy. We used optical flow analysis of ultra-fast functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) data to investigate the velocity characteristics of respiratory brain impulse propagation in patients with focal epilepsy treated with antiseizure medication (ASM) (medicated patients with focal epilepsy; ME, n = 23), drug-naïve patients with at least one seizure (DN, n = 19) and matched healthy control subjects (HC, n = 75). We detected in the two patient groups (ME and DN) several significant alterations in the respiratory brain pulsation propagation velocity, which showed a bidirectional change dominated by a reduction in speed. Furthermore, the respiratory impulses moved more in reversed or incoherent directions in both patient groups vs. the HC group. The speed reductions and directionality changes occurred in specific phases of the respiratory cycle. In conclusion, irrespective of medication status, both patient groups showed incoherent and slower respiratory brain impulses, which may contribute to epileptic brain pathology by hindering brain hydrodynamics.
与颅内轴内流体溶质转运有关的呼吸性脑脉动在局灶性癫痫中明显改变。我们使用超快功能磁共振成像 (fMRI) 数据的光流分析来研究抗癫痫药物治疗的局灶性癫痫患者 (ME，n=23)、至少有一次癫痫发作的药物未治疗患者 (DN，n=19) 和匹配的健康对照组 (HC，n=75) 中呼吸性脑脉冲传播的速度特征。我们在两个患者组 (ME 和 DN) 中检测到呼吸性脑脉动传播速度的几个显著变化，这些变化表现为速度降低为主的双向变化。此外，与 HC 组相比，两个患者组的呼吸脉冲在相反或不协调的方向上移动更多。速度降低和方向变化发生在呼吸周期的特定阶段。总之，无论是否使用药物，两组患者的呼吸性脑冲动都表现出不协调和较慢的特征，这可能通过阻碍脑内流体动力学而导致癫痫性脑病理。
