Yu-Dan Ding1, Ru Yang2, Chao-Gan Yan3, Xiao Chen4, Tong-Jian Bai5, Qi-Jing Bo6, Guan-Mao Chen7, Ning-Xuan Chen4, Tao-Lin Chen8, Wei Chen9, Chang Cheng1, Yu-Qi Cheng10, Xi-Long Cui1, Jia Duan11, Yi-Ru Fang12, Qi-Yong Gong8, Zheng-Hua Hou13, Lan Hu14, Li Kuang15, Feng Li6, Tao Li15, Yan-Song Liu16, Zhe-Ning Liu17, Yi-Cheng Long18, Qing-Hua Luo14, Hua-Qing Meng14, Dai-Hui Peng12, Hai-Tang Qiu14, Jiang Qiu18, Yue-Di Shen19, Yu-Shu Shi20, Yanqing Tang6, Chuan-Yue Wang6, Fei Wang11, Kai Wang5, Li Wang21, Xiang Wang1, Ying Wang7, Xiao-Ping Wu22, Xin-Ran Wu18, Chun-Ming Xie23, Guang-Rong Xie1, Hai-Yan Xie24, Peng Xie25, Xiu-Feng Xu10, Hong Yang20, Jian Yang26, Jia-Shu Yao10, Shu-Qiao Yao1, Ying-Ying Yin13, Yong-Gui Yuan13, Ai-Xia Zhang26, Hong Zhang22, Ke-Rang Zhang27, Lei Zhang4, Zhi-Jun Zhang23, Ru-Bai Zhou12, Yi-Ting Zhou15, Jun-Juan Zhu12, Chao-Jie Zou10, Tian-Mei Si21, Yu-Feng Zang28, Jing-Ping Zhao1, Wen-Bin Guo29. 1. National Clinical Research Center for Mental Disorders, and Department of Psychiatry, The Second Xiangya Hospital of Central South University. Changsha, Hunan 410011, China. 2. Department of Radiology, The Second Xiangya Hospital of Central South University. Changsha, Hunan 410011, China. 3. CAS Key Laboratory of Behavioral Science, Institute of Psychology, Beijing, China; Department of Psychology, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China; Magnetic Resonance Imaging Research Center and Research Center for Lifespan Development of Mind and Brain (CLIMB), Institute of Psychology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China; International Big-Data Center for Depression Research, Institute of Psychology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China. 4. CAS Key Laboratory of Behavioral Science, Institute of Psychology, Beijing, China; Department of Psychology, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China. 5. Anhui Medical University, Hefei, Anhui, China. 6. Beijing Anding Hospital, Capital Medical University, Beijing 100054, China. 7. The First Affiliated Hospital of Jinan University, Guangzhou, Guangdong, China. 8. Department of Radiology, Huaxi MR Research Center, West China Hospital of Sichuan University, Chengdu, Sichuan 610041, China; Psychoradiology Research Unit of Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences, West China Hospital of Sichuan University, Chengdu, Sichuan 610041, China. 9. Sir Run Run Shaw Hospital, Zhejiang University School of Medicine, Hangzhou, Zhejiang 310016, China. 10. First Affiliated Hospital of Kunming Medical University, Kunming, Yunnan 650221, China. 11. Department of Psychiatry, First Affiliated Hospital, China Medical University, Shenyang, Liaoning, China. 12. Department of Psychiatry, Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine, Shanghai 200240, China. 13. Department of Psychosomatics and Psychiatry, Zhongda Hospital, School of Medicine, Southeast University, Nanjing, Jiangsu 210096, China. 14. Department of Psychiatry, The First Affiliated Hospital of Chongqing Medical University, Chongqing, China. 15. Mental Health Center, West China Hospital, Sichuan University Chengdu, Sichuan, China. 16. Department of Clinical Psychology, Suzhou Psychiatric Hospital, The Affiliated Guangji Hospital of Soochow University, Suzhou, Jiangsu, China. 17. The Institute of Mental Health, Second Xiangya Hospital of Central South University, Changsha, Hunan 410008, China. 18. Faculty of Psychology, Southwest University, Chongqing 400716, China. 19. Department of Diagnostics, Affiliated Hospital, Hangzhou Normal University Medical School, Hangzhou, Zhejiang 311121, China. 20. Department of Radiology, The First Affiliated Hospital, College of Medicine, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, Zhejiang 310058, China. 21. National Clinical Research Center for Mental Disorders, Peking University Sixth Hospital, Beijing 100191, China; Key Laboratory of Mental Health, Ministry of Health, Peking University, Beijing 100191, China. 22. Xi'an Central Hospital, Xi'an, Shaanxi, China. 23. Department of Neurology, Affiliated ZhongDa Hospital of Southeast University, Nanjing, Jiangsu 210009, China. 24. Department of Psychiatry, The Fourth Affiliated Hospital, College of Medicine, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, Zhejiang 310058, China. 25. Institute of Neuroscience, Chongqing Medical University, Chongqing 400016, China; Chongqing Key Laboratory of Neurobiology, Chongqing 400016, China; Department of Neurology, The First Affiliated Hospital of Chongqing Medical University, Chongqing, China. 26. The First Affiliated Hospital of Xi'an Jiaotong University, Shaanxi 710061, China. 27. First Hospital of Shanxi Medical University, Taiyuan, Shanxi 030006, China. 28. Center for Cognition and Brain Disorders, Institutes of Psychological Sciences, Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou, Zhejiang 311121, China; Zhejiang Key Laboratory for Research in Assessment of Cognitive Impairments, Hangzhou, Zhejiang 311121, China. 29. National Clinical Research Center for Mental Disorders, and Department of Psychiatry, The Second Xiangya Hospital of Central South University. Changsha, Hunan 410011, China. Electronic address: guowenbin76@csu.edu.cn.
Abstract
BACKGROUND: Functional specialization is a feature of human brain for understanding the pathophysiology of major depressive disorder (MDD). The degree of human specialization refers to within and cross hemispheric interactions. However, most previous studies only focused on interhemispheric connectivity in MDD, and the results varied across studies. Hence, brain functional connectivity asymmetry in MDD should be further studied. METHODS: Resting-state fMRI data of 753 patients with MDD and 451 healthy controls were provided by REST-meta-MDD Project. Twenty-five project contributors preprocessed their data locally with the Data Processing Assistant State fMRI software and shared final indices. The parameter of asymmetry (PAS), a novel voxel-based whole-brain quantitative measure that reflects inter- and intrahemispheric asymmetry, was reported. We also examined the effects of age, sex and clinical variables (including symptom severity, illness duration and three depressive phenotypes). RESULTS: Compared with healthy controls, patients with MDD showed increased PAS scores (decreased hemispheric specialization) in most of the areas of default mode network, control network, attention network and some regions in the cerebellum and visual cortex. Demographic characteristics and clinical variables have significant effects on these abnormalities. LIMITATIONS: Although a large sample size could improve statistical power, future independent efforts are needed to confirm our results. CONCLUSIONS: Our results highlight the idea that many brain networks contribute to broad clinical pathophysiology of MDD, and indicate that a lateralized, efficient and economical brain information processing system is disrupted in MDD. These findings may help comprehensively clarify the pathophysiology of MDD in a new hemispheric specialization perspective.
BACKGROUND: Functional specialization is a feature of human brain for understanding the pathophysiology of major depressive disorder (MDD). The degree of human specialization refers to within and cross hemispheric interactions. However, most previous studies only focused on interhemispheric connectivity in MDD, and the results varied across studies. Hence, brain functional connectivity asymmetry in MDD should be further studied. METHODS: Resting-state fMRI data of 753 patients with MDD and 451 healthy controls were provided by REST-meta-MDD Project. Twenty-five project contributors preprocessed their data locally with the Data Processing Assistant State fMRI software and shared final indices. The parameter of asymmetry (PAS), a novel voxel-based whole-brain quantitative measure that reflects inter- and intrahemispheric asymmetry, was reported. We also examined the effects of age, sex and clinical variables (including symptom severity, illness duration and three depressive phenotypes). RESULTS: Compared with healthy controls, patients with MDD showed increased PAS scores (decreased hemispheric specialization) in most of the areas of default mode network, control network, attention network and some regions in the cerebellum and visual cortex. Demographic characteristics and clinical variables have significant effects on these abnormalities. LIMITATIONS: Although a large sample size could improve statistical power, future independent efforts are needed to confirm our results. CONCLUSIONS: Our results highlight the idea that many brain networks contribute to broad clinical pathophysiology of MDD, and indicate that a lateralized, efficient and economical brain information processing system is disrupted in MDD. These findings may help comprehensively clarify the pathophysiology of MDD in a new hemispheric specialization perspective.