Li Guangfei, Dong Yun, Chen Yu, Li Bao, Chaudhary Shefali, Bi Jinbo, Sun Hao, Yang Chunlan, Liu Youjun, Li Chiang-Shan R
Department of Biomedical Engineering, College of Chemistry and Life Science, Beijing University of Technology, Beijing, China.
Beijing International Science and Technology Cooperation Base for Intelligent Physiological Measurement and Clinical Transformation, Beijing, China.
Quant Imaging Med Surg. 2024 Sep 1;14(9):6669-6683. doi: 10.21037/qims-24-815. Epub 2024 Aug 26.
The hypothalamus is a key hub of the neural circuits of motivated behavior. Alcohol misuse may lead to hypothalamic dysfunction. Here, we investigated how resting-state hypothalamic functional connectivities are altered in association with the severity of drinking and clinical comorbidities and how men and women differ in this association.
We employed the data of the Human Connectome Project. A total of 870 subjects were included in data analyses. The severity of alcohol use was quantified for individual subjects with the first principal component (PC1) identified from principal component analyses of all drinking measures. Rule-breaking and intrusive scores were evaluated with the Achenbach Adult Self-Report Scale. We performed a whole-brain regression of hypothalamic connectivities on drinking PC1 in all subjects and men/women separately and evaluated the results at a corrected threshold.
Higher drinking PC1 was associated with greater hypothalamic connectivity with the paracentral lobule (PCL). Hypothalamic PCL connectivity was positively correlated with rule-breaking score in men (r=0.152, P=0.002) but not in women. In women but not men, hypothalamic connectivity with the left temporo-parietal junction (LTPJ) was negatively correlated with drinking PC1 (r=-0.246, P<0.001) and with intrusiveness score (r=-0.127, P=0.006). Mediation analyses showed that drinking PC1 mediated the relationship between hypothalamic PCL connectivity and rule-breaking score in men and between hypothalamic LTPJ connectivity and intrusiveness score bidirectionally in women.
We characterized sex-specific hypothalamic connectivities in link with the severity of alcohol misuse and its comorbidities. These findings extend the literature by elucidating the potential impact of problem drinking on the motivation circuits.
下丘脑是动机行为神经回路的关键枢纽。酒精滥用可能导致下丘脑功能障碍。在此，我们研究了静息状态下下丘脑功能连接如何随着饮酒严重程度和临床合并症而改变，以及男性和女性在这种关联上的差异。
我们使用了人类连接组计划的数据。共有870名受试者纳入数据分析。通过对所有饮酒测量指标进行主成分分析确定的第一主成分（PC1）对个体受试者的饮酒严重程度进行量化。使用阿肯巴克成人自我报告量表评估违规和侵扰分数。我们分别对所有受试者以及男性/女性进行下丘脑连接性与饮酒PC1的全脑回归，并在校正阈值下评估结果。
较高的饮酒PC1与下丘脑与中央旁小叶（PCL）的更强连接相关。下丘脑与PCL的连接在男性中与违规分数呈正相关（r = 0.152，P = 0.002），而在女性中则不然。在女性而非男性中，下丘脑与左侧颞顶联合区（LTPJ）的连接与饮酒PC1呈负相关（r = -0.246，P < 0.001），并与侵扰分数呈负相关（r = -0.127，P = 0.006）。中介分析表明，饮酒PC1在男性中介导了下丘脑与PCL连接和违规分数之间的关系，在女性中双向介导了下丘脑与LTPJ连接和侵扰分数之间的关系。
我们描述了与酒精滥用严重程度及其合并症相关的性别特异性下丘脑连接。这些发现通过阐明问题饮酒对动机回路的潜在影响扩展了文献。
