Alterations in Brain Structure and Functional Connectivity in Alcohol Dependent Patients and Possible Association with Impulsivity

• Published in: PloS one Vol. 11; no. 8; p. e0161956
• Main Authors: Wang, Junkai, Fan, Yunli, Dong, Yue, Ma, Mengying, Ma, Yi, Dong, Yuru, Niu, Yajuan, Jiang, Yin, Wang, Hong, Wang, Zhiyan, Wu, Liuzhen, Sun, Hongqiang, Cui, Cailian
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States Public Library of Science 30.08.2016; Public Library of Science (PLoS)
• Subjects: Addicts; Adult; Alcoholics; Alcoholism; Alcoholism - diagnostic imaging; Alcoholism - pathology; Alcoholism - physiopathology; Alcohols; Alterations; Anisotropy; Biology and Life Sciences; Brain; Brain - diagnostic imaging; Brain - pathology; Brain mapping; Change detection; Cortex (cingulate); Decision making; Drug dependence; Female; Functional magnetic resonance imaging; Gray Matter - diagnostic imaging; Gray Matter - pathology; Humans; Impulsive behavior; Magnetic resonance; Magnetic resonance imaging; Magnetic Resonance Spectroscopy; Male; Medicine and Health Sciences; Middle Aged; Morphometry; Nerve impulses; Neural networks; Neural Pathways - diagnostic imaging; Neural Pathways - physiopathology; Neuroimaging; Neurosciences; NMR; Nuclear magnetic resonance; Patients; Physiological aspects; Prefrontal cortex; Psychological aspects; Putamen; Reinforcement; Research and Analysis Methods; Social Sciences; Structure-function relationships; Substantia alba; Substantia grisea; White Matter - diagnostic imaging; White Matter - pathology; China
• ISSN: 1932-6203; 1932-6203
• DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0161956

Previous studies have documented that heightened impulsivity likely contributes to the development and maintenance of alcohol use disorders. However, there is still a lack of studies that comprehensively detected the brain changes associated with abnormal impulsivity in alcohol addicts. This study was designed to investigate the alterations in brain structure and functional connectivity associated with abnormal impulsivity in alcohol dependent patients. Brain structural and functional magnetic resonance imaging data as well as impulsive behavior data were collected from 20 alcohol dependent patients and 20 age- and sex-matched healthy controls respectively. Voxel-based morphometry was used to investigate the differences of grey matter volume, and tract-based spatial statistics was used to detect abnormal white matter regions between alcohol dependent patients and healthy controls. The alterations in resting-state functional connectivity in alcohol dependent patients were examined using selected brain areas with gray matter deficits as seed regions. Compared with healthy controls, alcohol dependent patients had significantly reduced gray matter volume in the mesocorticolimbic system including the dorsal posterior cingulate cortex, the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex, the medial prefrontal cortex, the orbitofrontal cortex and the putamen, decreased fractional anisotropy in the regions connecting the damaged grey matter areas driven by higher radial diffusivity value in the same areas and decreased resting-state functional connectivity within the reward network. Moreover, the gray matter volume of the left medial prefrontal cortex exhibited negative correlations with various impulse indices. These findings suggest that chronic alcohol dependence could cause a complex neural changes linked to abnormal impulsivity.