Altered resting-state functional connectivity of the cerebellum in schizophrenia

• Published in: Brain imaging and behavior Vol. 12; no. 2; pp. 383 - 389
• Main Authors: Zhuo, Chuanjun, Wang, Chunli, Wang, Lina, Guo, Xinyu, Xu, Qingying, Liu, Yanyan, Zhu, Jiajia
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: New York Springer US 01.04.2018; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Abnormalities; Adult; Biomedical and Life Sciences; Biomedicine; Brain Mapping - methods; Cerebellum; Cerebellum - diagnostic imaging; Cerebellum - physiopathology; Female; Functional magnetic resonance imaging; Hemispheric laterality; Humans; Magnetic Resonance Imaging; Male; Mental disorders; Neural Pathways - physiopathology; Neuroimaging; Neuropsychology; Neuroradiology; Neurosciences; Nuclei; Original Research; Patients; Prefrontal cortex; Psychiatry; Rest; Schizophrenia; Schizophrenia - diagnostic imaging; Schizophrenia - physiopathology; Seeds; Somatosensory cortex; Structure-function relationships; Visual cortex; Cerebellum; Functional connectivity; Schizophrenia; Resting-state fMRI; Functional connectivity density
• ISSN: 1931-7557; 1931-7565; 1931-7565
• DOI: 10.1007/s11682-017-9704-0

Structural and functional abnormalities of the cerebellum in schizophrenia have been reported. Most previous studies investigating resting-state functional connectivity (rsFC) have relied on a priori restrictions on seed regions or specific networks, which may bias observations. In this study, we aimed to elicit the connectivity alterations of the cerebellum in schizophrenia in a hypothesis-free approach. Ninety-five schizophrenia patients and 93 sex- and age-matched healthy controls underwent resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). A voxel-wise data-driven method, resting-state functional connectivity density (rsFCD), was used to investigate cerebellar connectivity changes in schizophrenia patients. Regions with altered rsFCD were chosen as seeds to perform seed-based resting-state functional connectivity (rsFC) analyses. We found that schizophrenia patients exhibited decreased rsFCD in the right hemispheric VI; moreover, this cerebellar region showed increased rsFC with the prefrontal cortex and subcortical nuclei and decreased rsFC with the visual cortex and sensorimotor cortex. In addition, some rsFC changes were associated with positive symptoms. These findings suggest that abnormalities of the cerebellar hub and cerebellar-subcortical-cortical loop may be the underlying mechanisms of schizophrenia.