Wu Kang, Zou Yihuai, Li Yuanyuan, Hu Xiaojie, Wang Yahui, Chen Tianzhu, Chen Yuhang, Li Kuangshi
Dongzhimen Hospital, Beijing University of Chinese Medicine, Beijing, China.
Iowa Neuroscience Institute, University of Iowa Carver College of Medicine, Iowa City, IA, United States.
Front Neurosci. 2025 Mar 17;19:1535088. doi: 10.3389/fnins.2025.1535088. eCollection 2025.
Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS) is a disease characterized by unexplained fatigue and impaired cognition for more than 6 months. Recent studies have reported declines in large-scale brain networks' functional connections among patients with CFS, and these declines correlated with the patients' symptom severity. However, these reported networks are inconsistent. Brain structure serves as the essential architecture supporting brain functional fluctuations. Investigating structural alterations could provide insights into functional changes in different brain areas and facilitate the clinical diagnosis of CFS. In this study, we recruited 37 patients with CFS and 34 healthy controls to collect their clinical assessments and structural magnetic resonance imaging data. Multiple Voxel Pattern Analysis (MVPA) was employed to recognize chronic fatigue-related brain areas, and cortical thickness was compared between the two groups. By constructing a predictive MVPA classifier with 70% balanced accuracy, we identified five relevant brain areas, including the paracentral cortex, precentral cortex, central cortex, intraparietal cortex, and superior temporal cortex. Subsequently, the results showed that the thickness of these areas had associations with fatigue severity, healthy life status, and pain levels among our subjects. Furthermore, compared to healthy controls, the thickness reduction was observed in patients with CFS. In summary, our study revealed a pathological chronic fatigue pattern for understanding CFS and suggested associations between cortical atrophy and CFS, with the aim of highlighting potential impacts of chronic fatigue. The trial was registered in the Chinese Clinical Trial Registry (ChiCTR2000032577).
慢性疲劳综合征（CFS）是一种以不明原因的疲劳和认知功能受损超过6个月为特征的疾病。最近的研究报告称，CFS患者的大规模脑网络功能连接有所下降，且这些下降与患者的症状严重程度相关。然而，这些报告的网络并不一致。脑结构是支持脑功能波动的基本架构。研究结构改变可以深入了解不同脑区的功能变化，并有助于CFS的临床诊断。在本研究中，我们招募了37名CFS患者和34名健康对照者，收集他们的临床评估和结构磁共振成像数据。采用多体素模式分析（MVPA）来识别与慢性疲劳相关的脑区，并比较两组之间的皮质厚度。通过构建一个平衡准确率为70%的预测性MVPA分类器，我们确定了五个相关脑区，包括中央旁皮质、中央前皮质、中央皮质、顶内皮质和颞上皮质。随后，结果表明这些区域的厚度与我们研究对象的疲劳严重程度以及健康生活状态和疼痛水平有关。此外，与健康对照相比，CFS患者观察到皮质厚度减少。总之，我们的研究揭示了一种用于理解CFS的病理性慢性疲劳模式，并表明皮质萎缩与CFS之间存在关联，旨在突出慢性疲劳的潜在影响。该试验已在中国临床试验注册中心注册（ChiCTR2000032577）。
