Impaired Parahippocampus Connectivity in Mild Cognitive Impairment and Alzheimer’s Disease

作者：Jieqiong Liu, Xinqing Zhang, Chunshui Yu, Yunyun Duan, Junjie Zhuo, Yue Cui, Bing Liu, Kuncheng Li, Tianzi Jiang, Yong Liu · 发表于：Journal of Alzheimer s Disease · 年份：2015 · DOI：10.3233/jad-150727 · 被引用次数：65 · 研究领域：Functional Brain Connectivity Studies、Dementia and Cognitive Impairment Research、Advanced MRI Techniques and Applications

BACKGROUND: The parahippocampal gyrus (PHG) is an important region of the limbic system that plays an important role in episodic memory. Elucidation of the PHG connectivity pattern will aid in the understanding of memory deficits in neurodegenerative diseases. OBJECTIVE: To investigate if disease severity associated altered PHG connectivity in Alzheimer's disease (AD) exists. METHODS: We evaluated resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging data from 18 patients with amnestic mild cognitive impairment (MCI), 35 patients with AD, and 21 controls. The PHG connectivity pattern was examined by calculating Pearson's correlation coefficients between the bilateral PHG and whole brain. Group comparisons were performed after controlling for the effects of age and gender. The functional connectivity strength in each identified region was correlated with the MMSE score to evaluate the relationship between connectivity and cognitive ability. RESULTS: Several brain regions of the default mode network showed reduced PHG connectivity in the AD patients, and PHG connectivity was associated with disease severity in the MCI and AD subjects. More importantly, correlation analyses showed that there were positive correlations between the connectivity strengths of the left PHG-PCC/Pcu and left PHG-left MTG and the Mini-Mental State Examination, indicating that with disease progression from MCI to severe AD, damage to the functional connectivity of the PHG becomes increasingly severe. CONCL...