Impaired functional default mode network in patients with mild neurological Wilson's disease

Yongsheng Han, Hewei Cheng, Jon B. Toledo, Xun Wang, Bo Li, Yongzhu Han, Kai Wang, Yong Fan

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

14 Scopus citations

Abstract

Wilson's disease (WD) is an autosomal recessive metabolic disorder characterized by cognitive, psychiatric and motor signs and symptoms that are associated with structural and pathological brain abnormalities, in addition to liver changes. However, functional brain connectivity pattern of WD patients remains largely unknown. In the present study, we investigated functional brain connectivity pattern of WD patients using resting state functional magnetic resonance imaging. Particularly, we studied default mode network (DMN) using posterior cingulate cortex (PCC) based seed functional connectivity analysis and graph theoretic functional brain network analysis tools, and investigated the relationship between the DMN's functional connectivity pattern of WD patients and their attention functions examined using the attention network test (ANT). Our results demonstrated that WD patients had altered DMN's functional connectivity and lower local and global network efficiency compared with normal controls (NCs). In addition, the functional connectivity between left inferior temporal cortex and right lateral parietal cortex was correlated with altering function, one of the attention functions, across WD and NC subjects. These findings indicated that the DMN's functional connectivity was altered in WD patients, which might be correlated with their attention dysfunction.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Pages (from-to)46-51
Number of pages6
JournalParkinsonism and Related Disorders
Volume30
DOIs
StatePublished - Sep 1 2016

Keywords

  • Alerting efficiency
  • Default mode network
  • Functional connectivity
  • Posterior cingulate cortex
  • Wilson's disease

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Neurology
  • Geriatrics and Gerontology
  • Clinical Neurology

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