Impaired Interhemispheric Synchrony in Bronchial Asthma

Ya-Jun Wu; Jie Rao; Xin Huang; Na Wu; Ling Shi; Hui Huang; Si-Yu Li; Xiao-Lin Chen; Shui-Qin Huang; Pei-Pei Zhong; Xiao-Rong Wu; Jun Wang

doi:10.2147/IJGM.S343269

Impaired Interhemispheric Synchrony in Bronchial Asthma

Int J Gen Med. 2021 Dec 24:14:10315-10325. doi: 10.2147/IJGM.S343269. eCollection 2021.

Authors

Ya-Jun Wu^#¹, Jie Rao^#¹, Xin Huang², Na Wu¹, Ling Shi¹, Hui Huang¹, Si-Yu Li¹, Xiao-Lin Chen¹, Shui-Qin Huang¹, Pei-Pei Zhong¹, Xiao-Rong Wu¹, Jun Wang³

Affiliations

¹ Department of Ophthalmology, The First Affiliated Hospital of Nanchang University, Nanchang, Jiangxi Province, People's Republic of China.
² Department of Ophthalmology, Jiangxi Provincial People's Hospital Affiliated to Nanchang University, Nanchang, Jiangxi Province, People's Republic of China.
³ Department of Respiratory Disease, Jiangxi Provincial People's Hospital Affiliated to Nanchang University, Nanchang, Jiangxi Province, People's Republic of China.

^# Contributed equally.

Abstract

Purpose: Converging evidence demonstrated that bronchial asthma (BA) individuals with hypoxia were associated with functional and morphological reorganization in the brain. However, the alterations of the interhemispheric functional connectivity in BA individuals remain unknown. The purpose of this study was to assess the interhemispheric functional connectivity changes in individuals with hypoxia due to middle-aged BA using voxel-mirrored homotopic connectivity (VMHC) methods.

Methods: In total, 31 BA individuals and 30 healthy controls (HCs) closely matched in age, sex, and education underwent resting-state magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans. VMHC analysis was performed to investigate differences in interhemispheric functional connectivity between the two groups. Then, a seed-based resting-state functional connectivity (rsFC) analysis was conducted to further reveal the abnormal functional connectivity between the altered VMHC regions and the whole brain.

Results: Compared with HCs, BA individuals had significantly lower VMHC values in the bilateral basal ganglia/thalamus/insula, cuneus/calcarine/lingual gyrus, precentral and postcentral gyrus. [voxel level P < 0.01, Gaussian random field (GRF) correction, cluster level P < 0.05]. Taking VMHC altered brain areas as seed points, the rsFC values of left insula/supramarginal/postcentral gyrus (PostCG)/inferior parietal lobule (IPL) brain areas in BA were increased.

Conclusion: The abnormal resting-state functional connectivity of middle-aged BA is altered in specific brain regions related to the basal ganglia network, visual network, and sensorimotor network, which may be related to the neuropathogenesis of asthma patients. Furthermore, these VMHC and FC values may be important clinical indicators for the diagnosis and treatment of asthma patients.

Keywords: basal ganglia network; bronchial asthma; functional magnetic resonance imaging; sensorimotor network; visual network; voxel-mirrored homotopic connectivity.

Grants and funding

National Natural Science Foundation of China (No.82160207, 81760179, 81360151); Health Development Planning Commission Science Foundation of Jiangxi Province (No. 20185118); Key research plan of Jiangxi Provincial Science and Technology Department (No.20192BBG70042); Key projects of Jiangxi Youth Science Fund (No.20202ACBL216008). National Natural Science Foundation of China (82160006); the Jiangxi Provincial Cultivation Program for Academic and Technical Leaders of Major Subjects (20172BCB22025); the Jiangxi Provincial Natural Science Fund Project (20202BAB206003).