Metabolic aberrations in fronto-parietal brain regions in recently detoxified alcohol dependent individuals: contribution to impaired abstract reasoning abilities
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1
INMAS, NMR Research Centre, India
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2
INMAS, India
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3
Panjab University, India
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4
Base Hospital, India
Excessive alcohol consumption leads to a variety of neuropsychological deficits, most evident in higher order cognitive functions, such as abstract reasoning and problem solving. A recent fMRI study at our centre has shown the role of fronto-parietal network in abstract reasoning abilities.1 Considering this, we performed a 1H MRS study on frontal gyrus and superior parietal lobule in alcoholics to explore the yet largely unknown relationship between metabolic alterations and impaired abstract reasoning abilities. The study included 25 alcohol dependent subjects and 20 healthy subjects. MRS data was obtained with a single voxel (SVS) point resolved spectroscopy sequence (PRESS) (TR=3300ms, TE= 30ms, voxel size=10*10*10 mm, averages=256) with water suppression.Relative concentrations of N-acetylaspartate (NAA), choline (Cho), myo-inositol (mI) and glutamate-glutamine (Glx) were reported as ratios relative to creatine. A correlation analysis was performed between metabolic ratios and the response accuracy (obtained from our abstract reasoning based fMRI task).1 Results showed significant reductions in NAA/Cr and Glx/Cr whereas there was a significant increase in Cho/Cr and mI/Cr in both the brain regions. Reductions in NAA levels attributes to neuronal loss while reduced Glx levels may reflect perturbation of Glu-Gln system. Raised mI may reflect astrocyte proliferation whereas increased Cho ratios indicate altered cell membrane metabolism. A significant correlation was observed between the response accuracy and NAA/Cr and Cho/Cr ratios suggesting metabolic alterations underlie the poor performance.The neuronal compromise that these metabolic changes reflect may contribute to the abstract reasoning deficits in alcohol dependent subjects. Our study thus shows a possible relationship between altered metabolism and function in the fronto-parietal circuit in chronic alcoholism.
References: 1. Bagga D et al. 2014(Neuroradiology, 56(1): 69-77).
Keywords:
Alcoholism,
MR spectroscopy,
abstract reasoning,
Metabolic alterations,
fronto-parietal circuit
Conference:
XII International Conference on Cognitive Neuroscience (ICON-XII), Brisbane, Queensland, Australia, 27 Jul - 31 Jul, 2014.
Presentation Type:
Poster
Topic:
Cognition and Executive Processes
Citation:
Bagga
D,
Singh
N,
Khushu
S,
Kaur
P,
Garg
M and
Bhattacharya
D
(2015). Metabolic aberrations in fronto-parietal brain regions in recently detoxified alcohol dependent individuals: contribution to impaired abstract reasoning abilities.
Conference Abstract:
XII International Conference on Cognitive Neuroscience (ICON-XII).
doi: 10.3389/conf.fnhum.2015.217.00087
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Received:
19 Feb 2015;
Published Online:
24 Apr 2015.
*
Correspondence:
Dr. Namita Singh, INMAS, NMR Research Centre, Delhi, India, namita23m@gmail.com