Rodriguez-Sabate Clara, Gonzalez Albano, Perez-Darias Juan Carlos, Morales Ingrid, Sole-Sabater Miguel, Rodriguez Manuel
Laboratory of Neurobiology and Experimental Neurology, Department of Physiology, Faculty of Medicine, University of La Laguna, Tenerife, Canary Islands, Spain.
Center for Networked Biomedical Research in Neurodegenerative Diseases (CIBERNED), Madrid, Spain.
Brain Imaging Behav. 2024 Feb;18(1):1-18. doi: 10.1007/s11682-023-00803-4. Epub 2023 Oct 12.
This study uses methods recently developed to study the complex evolution of atmospheric phenomena which have some similarities with the dynamics of the human brain. In both cases, it is possible to record the activity of particular centers (geographic regions or brain nuclei) but not to make an experimental modification of their state. The study of "causality", which is necessary to understand the dynamics of these complex systems and to develop robust models that can predict their evolution, is hampered by the experimental restrictions imposed by the nature of both systems. The study was performed with data obtained in the thalamus and basal ganglia of awake humans executing different tasks. This work studies the linear, non-linear and more complex relationships of these thalamic centers with the cortex and main BG nuclei, using three complementary techniques: the partial correlation regression method, the Gaussian process regression/distance correlation and a model-free method based on nearest-neighbor that computes the conditional mutual information. These causality methods indicated that the basal ganglia present a different functional relationship with the anterior-ventral (motor), intralaminar and medio-dorsal thalamic centers, and that more than 60% of these thalamus-basal ganglia relationships present a non-linear dynamic (35 of the 57 relationships found). These functional interactions were observed for basal ganglia nuclei with direct structural connections with the thalamus (primary somatosensory and motor cortex, striatum, internal globus pallidum and substantia nigra pars reticulata), but also for basal ganglia without structural connections with the thalamus (external globus pallidum and subthalamic nucleus). The motor tasks induced rapid modifications of the thalamus-basal ganglia interactions. These findings provide new perspectives of the thalamus - BG interactions, many of which may be supported by indirect functional relationships and not by direct excitatory/inhibitory interactions.
本研究采用了最近开发的方法来研究大气现象的复杂演化，这些大气现象与人类大脑的动力学有一些相似之处。在这两种情况下，都可以记录特定中心（地理区域或脑核）的活动，但无法对其状态进行实验性改变。对“因果关系”的研究对于理解这些复杂系统的动力学以及开发能够预测其演化的稳健模型是必要的，但受到这两个系统性质所施加的实验限制的阻碍。该研究使用了在执行不同任务的清醒人类的丘脑和基底神经节中获得的数据。这项工作使用三种互补技术研究了这些丘脑中心与皮层和主要基底神经节核之间的线性、非线性和更复杂的关系：偏相关回归方法、高斯过程回归/距离相关以及基于最近邻的无模型方法，该方法计算条件互信息。这些因果关系方法表明，基底神经节与前腹侧（运动）、板内核和背内侧丘脑中心呈现出不同的功能关系，并且这些丘脑 - 基底神经节关系中超过60%呈现出非线性动态（在发现的57种关系中有35种）。这些功能相互作用在与丘脑有直接结构连接的基底神经节核（初级体感和运动皮层、纹状体、苍白球内部和黑质网状部）中被观察到，而且在与丘脑没有结构连接的基底神经节（苍白球外部和底丘脑核）中也被观察到。运动任务引起了丘脑 - 基底神经节相互作用的快速改变。这些发现为丘脑 - 基底神经节的相互作用提供了新的视角，其中许多可能由间接功能关系支持，而不是由直接的兴奋性/抑制性相互作用支持。
