58 results on '"Kircher TT"'
Search Results
2. Neural correlates of verbal episodic memory in patients with MCI and Alzheimer's disease--a VBM study.
- Author
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Leube DT, Weis S, Freymann K, Erb M, Jessen F, Heun R, Grodd W, and Kircher TT
- Abstract
OBJECTIVE: The hippocampus is a key area for episodic memory processes. Hippocampal atrophy is a hallmark feature of Alzheimer's disease (AD). We used a new and automatized morphometric technique to better characterize brain atrophy in subjects with different levels of cognitive deficit. METHODS: In this study 21 participants with Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI), 12 patients with early AD and 29 elderly control subjects were subjected to high resolution MRI and a neuropsychological test battery. Brain volume across participants, measured by voxel-based morphometry (VBM), was correlated with verbal memory capacity, measured with a verbal memory test (VLMT). RESULTS: Atrophy in the anterior hippocampus, the ento- and perirhinal cortex as well as the parahippocampal gyrus, middle temporal gyrus and anterior cingulate cortex correlated closely with episodic memory performance. CONCLUSIONS: These brain areas are known to subserve episodic encoding of verbal material. The data contribute to a better understanding of atrophic brain processes in subjects at risk for AD. A combination of neuropsychological testing and voxel-based morphometry may serve as a diagnostic tool in the future. Copyright (c) 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
- Published
- 2008
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3. A randomised trial of a geriatric evaluation and management consultation services in frail hospitalised patients.
- Author
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Kircher TT, Wormstall H, Müller PH, Schwärzler F, Buchkremer G, Wild K, Hahn JM, and Meisner C
- Published
- 2007
4. Cerebral dysfunctions of emotion-cognition interactions in adolescent-onset schizophrenia.
- Author
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Pauly K, Seiferth NY, Kellermann T, Backes V, Vloet TD, Shah NJ, Schneider F, Habel U, and Kircher TT
- Published
- 2008
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5. Genome-wide association study of major anxiety disorders in 122,341 European-ancestry cases identifies 58 loci and highlights GABAergic signaling.
- Author
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Strom NI, Verhulst B, Bacanu SA, Cheesman R, Purves KL, Gedik H, Mitchell BL, Kwong AS, Faucon AB, Singh K, Medland S, Colodro-Conde L, Krebs K, Hoffmann P, Herms S, Gehlen J, Ripke S, Awasthi S, Palviainen T, Tasanko EM, Peterson RE, Adkins DE, Shabalin AA, Adams MJ, Iveson MH, Campbell A, Thomas LF, Winsvold BS, Drange OK, Børte S, Ter Kuile AR, Nguyen TH, Meier SM, Corfield EC, Hannigan L, Levey DF, Czamara D, Weber H, Choi KW, Pistis G, Couvy-Duchesne B, Van der Auwera S, Teumer A, Karlsson R, Garcia-Argibay M, Lee D, Wang R, Bjerkeset O, Stordal E, Bäckmann J, Salum GA, Zai CC, Kennedy JL, Zai G, Tiwari AK, Heilmann-Heimbach S, Schmidt B, Kaprio J, Kennedy MM, Boden J, Havdahl A, Middeldorp CM, Lopes FL, Akula N, McMahon FJ, Binder EB, Fehm L, Ströhle A, Castelao E, Tiemeier H, Stein DJ, Whiteman D, Olsen C, Fuller Z, Wang X, Wray NR, Byrne EM, Lewis G, Timpson NJ, Davis LK, Hickie IB, Gillespie NA, Milani L, Schumacher J, Woldbye DP, Forstner AJ, Nöthen MM, Hovatta I, Horwood J, Copeland WE, Maes HH, McIntosh AM, Andreassen OA, Zwart JA, Mors O, Børglum AD, Mortensen PB, Ask H, Reichborn-Kjennerud T, Najman JM, Stein MB, Gelernter J, Milaneschi Y, Penninx BW, Boomsma DI, Maron E, Erhardt-Lehmann A, Rück C, Kircher TT, Melzig CA, Alpers GW, Arolt V, Domschke K, Smoller JW, Preisig M, Martin NG, Lupton MK, Luik AI, Reif A, Grabe HJ, Larsson H, Magnusson PK, Oldehinkel AJ, Hartman CA, Breen G, Docherty AR, Coon H, Conrad R, Lehto K, Deckert J, Eley TC, Mattheisen M, and Hettema JM
- Abstract
The major anxiety disorders (ANX; including generalized anxiety disorder, panic disorder, and phobias) are highly prevalent, often onset early, persist throughout life, and cause substantial global disability. Although distinct in their clinical presentations, they likely represent differential expressions of a dysregulated threat-response system. Here we present a genome-wide association meta-analysis comprising 122,341 European ancestry ANX cases and 729,881 controls. We identified 58 independent genome-wide significant ANX risk variants and 66 genes with robust biological support. In an independent sample of 1,175,012 self-report ANX cases and 1,956,379 controls, 51 of the 58 associated variants were replicated. As predicted by twin studies, we found substantial genetic correlation between ANX and depression, neuroticism, and other internalizing phenotypes. Follow-up analyses demonstrated enrichment in all major brain regions and highlighted GABAergic signaling as one potential mechanism underlying ANX genetic risk. These results advance our understanding of the genetic architecture of ANX and prioritize genes for functional follow-up studies., Competing Interests: Per Hoffmann receives Salary from the Life & Brain GmbH, Bonn, Germany. James L. Kennedy is a member of the Scientific Advisory Board for Myriad Neuroscience Inc. Ian B. Hickie was an inaugural Commissioner on Australia’s National Mental Health Commission (2012-18). He is the Co-Director, Health and Policy at the Brain and Mind Centre (BMC) University of Sydney. The BMC operates an early-intervention youth services at Camperdown under contract to headspace. He is the Chief Scientific Advisor to, and a 5% equity shareholder in, InnoWell Pty Ltd. InnoWell was formed by the University of Sydney (45% equity) and PwC (Australia; 45% equity) to deliver the $30 M Australian Government-funded Project Synergy (2017-20; a three-year program for the transformation of mental health services) and to lead transformation of mental health services internationally through the use of innovative technologies. Andrew M. Mcintosh has received research support from Eli Lilly, Janssen, and The Sackler Trust. AMM has also received speaker fees from Illumina and Janssen. Murray B. Stein has in the past 3 years received consulting income from Acadia Pharmaceuticals, Aptinyx, atai Life Sciences, Boehringer Ingelheim, Bionomics, BioXcel Therapeutics, Clexio, Eisai, EmpowerPharm, Engrail Therapeutics, Janssen, Jazz Pharmaceuticals, and Roche/Genentech. Dr. Stein has stock options in Oxeia Biopharmaceuticals and EpiVario. He is paid for his editorial work on Depression and Anxiety (Editor-in-Chief), Biological Psychiatry (Deputy Editor), and UpToDate (Co-Editor-in-Chief for Psychiatry). He has also received research support from NIH, Department of Veterans Affairs, and the Department of Defense. He is on the scientific advisory board for the Brain and Behavior Research Foundation and the Anxiety and Depression Association of America. Joel Gelernter is named as an inventor on PCT patent application #15/878,640 entitled: “Genotype-guided dosing of opioid agonists,” filed January 24, 2018 and issued on January 26, 2021 as U.S. Patent No. 10,900,082; and is paid for editorial work for the journal “Complex Psychiatry.” Iiris Hovatta received speaker’s honoraria from Lundbeck. Ole A. Andreassen received speaker’s honorarium from Lundbeck and Sunovion, consultant for Cortechs.ai and Precision Health AS. Katharina Domschke has been a member of the Steering Committee Neurosciences, Janssen, Inc. until 2022 and is currently a member of the Board of the German National Society of Psychiatry (DGPPN) and the Neurotorium Editorial Board of the Lundbeck Foundation. Jordan W. Smoller is a member of the Scientific Advisory Board of Sensorium Therapeutics (with equity) and has received an honorarium for an internal seminar Tempus Labs. He is PI of a collaborative study of the genetics of depression and bipolar disorder sponsored by 23andMe for which 23andMe provides analysis time as in-kind support but no payments. Eduard Maron has received research support and has also received speaker fees from Lundbeck. Hans J. Grabe has received travel grants and speakers honoraria from Indorsia, Neuraxpharm, Servier and Janssen Cilag. Henrik Larsson has served as a speaker for Evolan Pharma, Medici and Shire/Takeda and has received research grants from Shire/Takeda; all outside the submitted work. Gerome Breen is an advisory board member for Compass Pathways. Jürgen Deckert is a member of the board of the German Society of Biological Psychiatry and is on the scientific advisory boards of non-profit organizations and foundations. Volker Arolt worked as an advisor for Sanofi-Adventis Germany. Zach Fuller and Xin Wang are employees of 23andMe and hold stock or stock options in 23andMe. All other authors have no competing interests to declare.
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- 2024
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6. Me, myself and I: temporal dysfunctions during self-evaluation in patients with schizophrenia.
- Author
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Pauly KD, Kircher TT, Schneider F, and Habel U
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- Adult, Analysis of Variance, Brain Mapping, Female, Humans, Image Processing, Computer-Assisted, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Male, Middle Aged, Monte Carlo Method, Neuropsychological Tests, Oxygen blood, Self-Assessment, Statistics, Nonparametric, Temporal Lobe blood supply, Diagnostic Self Evaluation, Schizophrenia pathology, Schizophrenic Psychology, Self Concept, Temporal Lobe physiopathology
- Abstract
Self-concept is deeply affected in schizophrenia. Positive symptoms in particular are related to disturbed self/other distinctions. The neural networks underlying self-evaluation in schizophrenia have barely been investigated. The study reported here involved 13 patients with schizophrenia and 13 matched controls. During functional MRI, participants decided in three conditions whether the presented positive and negative personality traits characterized themselves, an intimate person, or included a certain letter. Based on the responses, each experimental condition was designed using a flexible factorial model. Controls and patients showed a similar behavioral pattern during self-evaluation, with group comparison revealing decreased activation in patients in the left inferior temporal gyrus and both temporal poles during self-ascription of traits, and in the anterior medial prefrontal cortex during evaluation of an intimate person. In patients, positive symptoms correlated positively with brain activation in the left parahippocampus during trait self-ascription. Hence, while evaluating themselves, schizophrenia patients revealed decreased activation in areas related to self-awareness overlapping with networks involved in theory of mind, empathy and social knowledge. Moreover, patients' brain activation during self-reflection was affected by the current positive symptomatology. The close interaction between self and other highlights the clinical and social relevance of self-processing deficits in schizophrenia., (© The Author (2013). Published by Oxford University Press. For Permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oup.com.)
- Published
- 2014
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7. Dysconnectivity of the inferior frontal gyrus: implications for an impaired self-other distinction in patients with schizophrenia.
- Author
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Backasch B, Sommer J, Klöhn-Saghatolislam F, Müller MJ, Kircher TT, and Leube DT
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- Adult, Case-Control Studies, Cerebral Cortex pathology, Female, Humans, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Male, Movement, Cognition, Ego, Frontal Lobe physiopathology, Interpersonal Relations, Mirror Neurons, Schizophrenia physiopathology, Schizophrenic Psychology
- Abstract
Ego disturbances in schizophrenia might be caused by a failure of the efference copy mechanism, which compares efferent with reafferent signals and attenuates the sensory consequences of self-produced movements. We carried out a functional magnetic resonance imaging study in which 16 patients with schizophrenia and 16 healthy matched controls were studied while performing both intentional and unintentional continuous hand movements in two consecutive experiments. We periodically varied the delay of visual feedback to create a sensory-motor discrepancy. Exclusively for intentional movements the activation pattern of the inferior frontal gyrus (IFG) in patients was opposite to that of controls: less attenuated during time-congruent feedback and less activated during time-incongruent feedback. Additionally, several functional connections within the mismatch detection network (IFG with insula, putamen, medial orbitofrontal cortex) were affected. Also, activity of the dysconnected orbitofrontal cortex was correlated with ego disturbance in patients. We discuss that in healthy individuals the IFG might enable a distinction between self and non-self using time-characteristics of feedback, whereas in patients this sensory mismatch detection appears to be altered. Moreover, due to the dysconnectivity of the IFG, the efferent and reafferent signal exchange between perceptual and motor areas seems to be affected. This might cause self-monitoring deficits in patients, phenomena that contribute to the emergence of ego disturbances., (Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.)
- Published
- 2014
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8. Frequency and neural correlates of pauses in patients with formal thought disorder.
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Matsumoto K, Kircher TT, Stokes PR, Brammer MJ, Liddle PF, and McGuire PK
- Abstract
Background: Pauses during speech may reflect the planning and monitoring of discourse, two processes putatively impaired in patients with schizophrenia, particularly those with formal thought disorder (FTD). We used functional MRI to examine the neural correlates of between-clause and of filled pauses, which are respectively associated with speech planning and speech monitoring., Methods: BOLD contrast was measured while six schizophrenia patients with FTD and six healthy subjects spoke about Rorshach inkblots. In an event-related design, we examined activity associated with pauses that occurred between clauses and with pauses that were filled., Results: There was no significant group difference in the frequency of between-clause pauses but patients with FTD made strikingly fewer filled pauses than controls. Between-clause pauses were associated with activation in the anterior part of the left superior temporal gyrus (STG) and the left insula in controls and the engagement of these regions was significantly attenuated in patients., Conclusion: The anterior part of the left STG and the left insula are normally involved in both the planning and monitoring of discourse. The attenuated engagement of these regions with between-clause pauses and the striking infrequency of filled pauses in the patients are consistent with cognitive models implicating defective speech planning and speech monitoring in schizophrenia, especially in relation to FTD.
- Published
- 2013
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9. Age-related changes in parietal lobe activation during an episodic memory retrieval task.
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Oedekoven CS, Jansen A, Kircher TT, and Leube DT
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- Adolescent, Adult, Aged, Aged, 80 and over, Brain Mapping, Female, Humans, Image Processing, Computer-Assisted, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Male, Middle Aged, Neuropsychological Tests, Oxygen blood, Parietal Lobe blood supply, Photic Stimulation, Regression Analysis, Young Adult, Aging, Mental Recall physiology, Parietal Lobe physiology, Recognition, Psychology physiology
- Abstract
The crucial role of lateral parietal regions in episodic memory has been confirmed in previous studies. While aging has an influence on retrieval of episodic memory, it remains to be examined how the involvement of lateral parietal regions in episodic memory changes with age. We investigated episodic memory retrieval in two age groups, using faces as stimuli and retrieval success as a measure of episodic memory. Young and elderly participants showed activation within a similar network, including lateral and medial parietal as well as prefrontal regions, but elderly showed a higher level of brain activation regardless of condition. Furthermore, we examined functional connectivity in the two age groups and found a more extensive network in the young group, including correlations of parietal and prefrontal regions. In the elderly, the overall stronger activation related to memory performance may indicate a compensatory process for a less extensive functional network.
- Published
- 2013
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10. Hyperintentionality during automatic perception of naturalistic cooperative behavior in patients with schizophrenia.
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Backasch B, Straube B, Pyka M, Klöhn-Saghatolislam F, Müller MJ, Kircher TT, and Leube DT
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- Adult, Brain blood supply, Brain Mapping, Case-Control Studies, Female, Humans, Image Processing, Computer-Assisted, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Male, Neuropsychological Tests, Schizophrenia physiopathology, Surveys and Questionnaires, Automatism, Brain physiopathology, Cooperative Behavior, Schizophrenia pathology, Schizophrenic Psychology
- Abstract
Social cognition and the corresponding functionality of involved brain networks are essential for effortless social interaction. Patients with schizophrenia exhibit impaired social functioning. In this study, we focused on the neural networks involved in the automatic perception of cooperative behavior and their alterations in schizophrenia. We performed a functional magnetic resonance imaging study of 19 schizophrenia patients and 19 healthy matched controls. Participants watched a set of short videos with two actors manipulating objects, either with (C+) or without cooperation (C-). Additionally, we assessed delusional symptoms in patients using the Scales for the Assessment of Positive Symptoms and psychosis proneness in healthy controls using the brief schizotypal personality questionnaire. The observed group-by-condition interaction revealed a contrasting activation pattern for patients versus healthy controls in the medial and lateral prefrontal cortex, the middle cingulate cortex, and the left angular gyrus. Furthermore, increased activation of the middle prefrontal areas, left angular gyrus, and the posterior sulcus temporalis superior in response to the noncooperative condition (C-) was positively correlated with delusional symptoms in patients. Our findings suggest an overactivated "theory of mind" network in patients for the processing of noncooperative behavior. Thus, "overmentalizing" might be based on delusions and altered processing of cooperative behavior in patients with schizophrenia.
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- 2013
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11. Cholinergic blockade under working memory demands encountered by increased rehearsal strategies: evidence from fMRI in healthy subjects.
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Voss B, Thienel R, Reske M, Kellermann T, Sheldrick AJ, Halfter S, Radenbach K, Shah NJ, Habel U, and Kircher TT
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- Adult, Down-Regulation physiology, Executive Function drug effects, Executive Function physiology, Humans, Male, Muscarinic Antagonists pharmacology, Neuropsychological Tests, Prefrontal Cortex drug effects, Prefrontal Cortex physiology, Reaction Time drug effects, Reaction Time physiology, Single-Blind Method, Synaptic Transmission drug effects, Synaptic Transmission physiology, Magnetic Resonance Imaging methods, Memory, Short-Term drug effects, Memory, Short-Term physiology, Receptors, Muscarinic physiology, Scopolamine pharmacology
- Abstract
The connection between cholinergic transmission and cognitive performance has been established in behavioural studies. The specific contribution of the muscarinic receptor system on cognitive performance and brain activation, however, has not been evaluated satisfyingly. To investigate the specific contribution of the muscarinic transmission on neural correlates of working memory, we examined the effects of scopolamine, an antagonist of the muscarinic receptors, using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). Fifteen healthy male, non-smoking subjects performed a fMRI scanning session following the application of scopolamine (0.4 mg, i.v.) or saline in a placebo-controlled, repeated measure, pseudo-randomized, single-blind design. Working memory was probed using an n-back task. Compared to placebo, challenging the cholinergic transmission with scopolamine resulted in hypoactivations in parietal, occipital and cerebellar areas and hyperactivations in frontal and prefrontal areas. These alterations are interpreted as compensatory strategies used to account for downregulation due to muscarinic acetylcholine blockade in parietal and cerebral storage systems by increased activation in frontal and prefrontal areas related to working memory rehearsal. Our results further underline the importance of cholinergic transmission to working memory performance and determine the specific contribution of muscarinic transmission on cerebral activation associated with executive functioning.
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- 2012
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12. Neural contributions to flow experience during video game playing.
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Klasen M, Weber R, Kircher TT, Mathiak KA, and Mathiak K
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- Adolescent, Adult, Attention physiology, Brain blood supply, Female, Humans, Image Processing, Computer-Assisted, Learning, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Male, Oxygen blood, Young Adult, Brain physiology, Brain Mapping, Feedback, Psychological, Motivation, Reward, Video Games psychology
- Abstract
Video games are an exciting part of new media. Although game play has been intensively studied, the underlying neurobiology is still poorly understood. Flow theory is a well-established model developed to describe subjective game experience. In 13 healthy male subjects, we acquired fMRI data during free play of a video game and analyzed brain activity based on the game content. In accordance with flow theory, we extracted the following factors from the game content: (i) balance between ability and challenge; (ii) concentration and focus; (iii) direct feedback of action results; (iv) clear goals; and (v) control over the situation/activity. We suggest that flow is characterized by specific neural activation patterns and that the latter can be assessed-at least partially-by content factors contributing to the emergence of flow. Each of the content factors was characterized by specific and distinguishable brain activation patterns, encompassing reward-related midbrain structures, as well as cognitive and sensorimotor networks. The activation of sensory and motor networks in the conjunction analyses underpinned the central role of simulation for flow experience. Flow factors can be validated with functional brain imaging which can improve the understanding of human emotions and motivational processes during media entertainment.
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- 2012
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13. Faulty suppression of irrelevant material in patients with thought disorder linked to attenuated frontotemporal activation.
- Author
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Arcuri SM, Broome MR, Giampietro V, Amaro E Jr, Kircher TT, Williams SC, Andrew CM, Brammer M, Morris RG, and McGuire PK
- Abstract
Formal thought disorder is a feature schizophrenia that manifests as disorganized, incoherent speech, and is associated with a poor clinical outcome. The neurocognitive basis of this symptom is unclear but it is thought to involve an impairment in semantic processing classically described as a loosening of meaningful associations. Using a paradigm derived from the n400 event-related, potential, we examined the extent to which regional activation during semantic processing is altered in schizophrenic patients with formal thought disorder. Ten healthy control and 18 schizophrenic participants (9 with and 9 without formal thought disorder) performed a semantic decision sentence task during an event-related functional magnetic resonance imaging experiment. We employed analysis of variance to estimate the main effects of semantic congruency and groups on activation and specific effects of formal thought disorder were addressed using post-hoc comparisons. We found that the frontotemporal network, normally engaged by a semantic decision task, was underactivated in schizophrenia, particularly in patients with FTD. This network is implicated in the inhibition of automatically primed stimuli and impairment of its function interferes with language processing and contributes to the production of incoherent speech.
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- 2012
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14. Neuromagnetic oscillations and hemodynamic correlates of P50 suppression in schizophrenia.
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Mathiak K, Ackermann H, Rapp A, Mathiak KA, Shergill S, Riecker A, and Kircher TT
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- Acoustic Stimulation, Adolescent, Adult, Brain blood supply, Electroencephalography, Female, Functional Laterality, Humans, Image Processing, Computer-Assisted, Magnetic Resonance Imaging methods, Magnetoencephalography, Male, Oxygen blood, Schizophrenia pathology, Time Factors, Young Adult, Biological Clocks physiology, Brain physiopathology, Evoked Potentials, Auditory physiology, Hemodynamics physiology, Schizophrenia physiopathology, Statistics as Topic
- Abstract
Behavioral and electrophysiological data indicate compromised stimulus suppression in schizophrenia. The physiological basis of this effect and its contributions to the etiology of the disease are poorly understood. We examined neural and metabolic measures of P50 suppression in 12 patients with schizophrenia and controls. First, whole-head magnetoencephalography (MEG) assessed amplitudes of left- and right-hemispheric evoked responses and induced oscillations. Secondly, functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) measured the hemodynamic responses to pairs of beeps with a short interval (500ms) as compared with those with a long interval (1500ms). The suppression of alpha power (8-13Hz) time-locked to the stimuli was negatively correlated with the suppression of evoked components and the hemodynamic measures. Remarkably, the suppression of alpha power was reduced in the patients already prior to stimulus onset. Conceivably, alpha oscillations play a central role in stimulus adaptation of neuronal networks and reflect an active mechanism for sensory suppression. The reduced stimulus suppression in schizophrenia seems to be in part due to impaired generation of alpha oscillations in the auditory cortex, resulting in higher metabolic demand as detected by fMRI. Delayed recovery of alpha rhythm may reflect an impaired gating function and contribute to sensory and cognitive deficits in schizophrenia., (Copyright © 2011 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.)
- Published
- 2011
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15. Supramodal representation of emotions.
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Klasen M, Kenworthy CA, Mathiak KA, Kircher TT, and Mathiak K
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- Acoustic Stimulation methods, Adolescent, Adult, Brain Mapping methods, Choice Behavior physiology, Computer Simulation, Facial Expression, Female, Humans, Magnetic Resonance Imaging methods, Male, Memory, Short-Term physiology, Photic Stimulation methods, Psychomotor Performance physiology, Auditory Perception physiology, Brain physiology, Emotions physiology, Visual Perception physiology
- Abstract
Supramodal representation of emotion and its neural substrates have recently attracted attention as a marker of social cognition. However, the question whether perceptual integration of facial and vocal emotions takes place in primary sensory areas, multimodal cortices, or in affective structures remains unanswered yet. Using novel computer-generated stimuli, we combined emotional faces and voices in congruent and incongruent ways and assessed functional brain data (fMRI) during an emotional classification task. Both congruent and incongruent audiovisual stimuli evoked larger responses in thalamus and superior temporal regions compared with unimodal conditions. Congruent emotions were characterized by activation in amygdala, insula, ventral posterior cingulate (vPCC), temporo-occipital, and auditory cortices; incongruent emotions activated a frontoparietal network and bilateral caudate nucleus, indicating a greater processing load in working memory and emotion-encoding areas. The vPCC alone exhibited differential reactions to congruency and incongruency for all emotion categories and can thus be considered a central structure for supramodal representation of complex emotional information. Moreover, the left amygdala reflected supramodal representation of happy stimuli. These findings document that emotional information does not merge at the perceptual audiovisual integration level in unimodal or multimodal areas, but in vPCC and amygdala.
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- 2011
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16. [The relationship between psychiatry and neurology].
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Oertel WH and Kircher TT
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- Germany, Humans, Mental Disorders complications, Nervous System Diseases complications, Syndrome, Mental Disorders diagnosis, Mental Disorders therapy, Nervous System Diseases diagnosis, Nervous System Diseases therapy, Neurology organization & administration, Patient Care Team trends, Psychiatry organization & administration
- Abstract
Neurology and psychiatry deal with diseases of the (central) nervous system. Historically neurological disorders are related to a proven organic basis, whereas psychiatric disorders are mainly defined by the phenomenology and course of the symptoms. Neuroscientific research methods such as molecular genetics, neurochemistry, neurophysiology, neuropathology, functional (SPECT, PET, fMRI) or structural (MRI) imaging have dramatically increased our knowledge of psychiatric and neurological disorders in the last 20 years. Accordingly diagnostic and therapeutic procedures and the long-term prognosis of numerous diseases in both disciplines have substantially improved (i.e. pharmacotherapy, psychotherapy, functional neurosurgery). For major brain disorders - such as dementia of the Alzheimer type - close collaboration between both disciplines is developing in diagnosis, therapy and care. Due to common neurobiological research topics, educational programs, medical training and the challenges of assuring appropriate care to patients with brain disorders, further cooperation between neurology and psychiatry is expected and necessary.
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- 2010
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17. The interaction of working memory and emotion in persons clinically at risk for psychosis: an fMRI pilot study.
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Pauly K, Seiferth NY, Kellermann T, Ruhrmann S, Daumann B, Backes V, Klosterkötter J, Shah NJ, Schneider F, Kircher TT, and Habel U
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- Adult, Brain pathology, Brain Mapping, Female, Humans, Image Processing, Computer-Assisted methods, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Male, Neuropsychological Tests, Pilot Projects, Psychotic Disorders complications, Statistics as Topic, Verbal Learning physiology, Young Adult, Brain blood supply, Memory Disorders etiology, Memory Disorders pathology, Memory, Short-Term physiology, Mood Disorders etiology, Mood Disorders pathology
- Abstract
Subtle emotional and cognitive dysfunctions may already be apparent in individuals at risk for psychosis. However, there is a paucity of research on the neural correlates of the interaction of both domains. It remains unclear whether those correlates are already dysfunctional before a transition to psychosis. We used functional magnetic resonance imaging to examine the interaction of working memory and emotion in 12 persons clinically at high risk for psychosis (CHR) and 12 healthy subjects individually matched for age, gender and parental education. Participants performed an n-back task while negative or neutral emotion was induced by olfactory stimulation. Although healthy and psychosis-prone subjects did not differ in their working memory performance or the evaluation of the induced emotion, decreased activations were found in CHR subjects in the superior parietal lobe and the precuneus during working memory and in the insula during emotion induction. Looking at the interaction, CHR subjects, showed decreased activation in the right superior temporal gyrus, which correlated negatively with psychopathological scores. Decreased activation was also found in the thalamus. However, an increase of activation emerged in several cerebellar regions. Dysfunctions in areas associated with controlling whether incoming information is linked to emotional content and in the integration of multimodal information might lead to compensatory activations of cerebellar regions known to be involved in olfactory and working memory processes. Our study underlines that cerebral dysfunctions related to cognitive and emotional processes, as well as their interaction, can emerge in persons with CHR, even in absence of behavioral differences., ((c) 2009 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)
- Published
- 2010
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18. The neural basis of disturbed efference copy mechanism in patients with schizophrenia.
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Leube DT, Knoblich G, Erb M, Schlotterbeck P, and Kircher TT
- Abstract
Core psychopathological symptoms in patients with schizophrenia suggest that their sense of self may be disturbed. A disturbance in predictive motor mechanisms may be the cause of such symptoms. Ten patients with schizophrenia and ten healthy right-handed control subjects opened and closed their hand. This movement was filmed with an MRI compatible video camera and projected online onto a monitor. BOLD contrast was measured with fMRI. The temporal delay between movement and feedback was parametrically varied. Participants judged whether or not there was a delay. Patients were less sensitive to these delays than a matched control group. Comparing neural activation between the two groups showed a reduced attenuation of movement-sensitive perceptual areas in patients with increasing delay and a higher activation in the putamen in controls. The results provide further evidence that impaired efference copy mechanisms may contribute to the pathogenesis of schizophrenia and its first rank symptoms.
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- 2010
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19. The influence of multiple primes on bottom-up and top-down regulation during meaning retrieval: evidence for 2 distinct neural networks.
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Whitney C, Grossman M, and Kircher TT
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- Adult, Cues, Humans, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Male, Comprehension physiology, Frontal Lobe physiology, Mental Recall physiology, Nerve Net physiology, Pattern Recognition, Visual physiology, Semantics
- Abstract
Meaning retrieval of a word can proceed fast and effortlessly or can be characterized by a controlled search for candidate lexical items and a subsequent selection process. In the current study, we facilitated meaning retrieval by increasing the number of words that were related to the final target word in a triplet (e.g., lion-stripes-tiger). To induce higher search and selection demands, we presented ambiguous words as targets (i.e., homonyms like ball) in half of the trials. Hereby, the dominant (game), low-frequent (dance), or both meanings of the homonym were primed. Participants performed a relatedness judgment during functional magnetic resonance imaging. Activation in a bilateral network (angular gyrus, rostromedial prefrontal cortex) increased linearly with multiple related primes, whereas the posterior left inferior prefrontal cortex (pLIPC) showed the reverse activation pattern for unambiguous trials. When homonyms served as targets, pLIPC responded strongest when both meanings or low-frequent concepts were addressed. Additional anterior left inferior prefrontal cortex activation was observed for the latter trials only. The data support an interaction between 2 distinct cerebral networks that can be linked to automatic bottom-up support and top-down control during meaning retrieval. They further imply a functional specialization of the LIPC along an anterior-posterior dimension.
- Published
- 2009
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20. Self-face recognition in schizophrenia.
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Kircher TT, Seiferth NY, Plewnia C, Baar S, and Schwabe R
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- Adult, Discrimination, Psychological, Female, Humans, Male, Psychological Tests, Visual Fields, Visual Perception physiology, Brain physiopathology, Face, Recognition, Psychology, Schizophrenia physiopathology, Self Concept
- Abstract
Objective: Altered self-awareness might be a core feature of schizophrenia. Facial self-recognition in children and non-human primates has been linked to the emergence of self-awareness. In this study, the ability to recognize the own face as an indicator of certain aspects of self-awareness was investigated in patients with schizophrenia., Methods: Standardized facial pictures of the participants (20 patients with DSM-IV schizophrenia and 20 healthy controls), of close same-sex relatives of the participants and of unknown persons were taken. These stimuli were presented on a computer screen serially in three forced choice identity recognition experiments: facial identities were presented (I) for 5 s centrally on the screen; (II) in the participants' left and right visual hemifields for 100 ms; (III) as morphed blendings between the identities, centrally for 5 s., Results: There was no interaction between group and facial identity in experiments I and III. However, in experiment II an interaction between hemifield and identity emerged in the patients (p=.002). They exhibited higher error rates for their own face presented to the right hemifield (p=.003), whereas there was no effect for the control subjects. Additionally, self-face recognition (reaction time in experiment I; p=.0009 and error rates in II; p=.0006) was related to hallucinations in the patients., Conclusions: These results support the notion of a specific self-face processing dysfunction in schizophrenia. This might be related to altered self-awareness in schizophrenia.
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- 2007
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21. Hippocampal activation in patients with mild cognitive impairment is necessary for successful memory encoding.
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Kircher TT, Weis S, Freymann K, Erb M, Jessen F, Grodd W, Heun R, and Leube DT
- Subjects
- Aged, Alzheimer Disease physiopathology, Case-Control Studies, Evoked Potentials, Female, Humans, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Male, Middle Aged, Cognition Disorders physiopathology, Hippocampus physiology, Memory physiology
- Abstract
Background: Episodic memory enables us to consciously recollect personally experienced past events. Memory performance is reduced in patients with mild cognitive impairment (MCI), an at-risk condition for Alzheimer's disease (AD)., Patients and Methods: We used functional MRI (fMRI) to compare brain activity during memory encoding in 29 healthy elderly subjects (mean age 67.7 (SD 5.4) years) and 21 patients with MCI (mean age 69.7 (SD 7.0) years). Subjects remembered a list of words while fMRI data were acquired. Later, they had to recognise these words among a list of distractor words. The use of an event related paradigm made it possible to selectively analyse successfully encoded items in each individual. We compared activation for successfully encoded words between healthy elderly subjects and patients with MCI., Results: The main intergroup difference was found in the left hippocampus and surrounding medial temporal lobe (MTL) regions for the patients with MCI compared with healthy subjects during successful encoding., Conclusion: These results suggest that in patients with MCI, an increase in MTL activation is necessary for successful memory encoding. Hippocampal activation may help to link newly learned information to items already stored in memory. Increased activation in MTL regions in MCI may reflect a compensatory response to the beginning of AD pathology.
- Published
- 2007
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22. Mild cognitive impairment (MCI) and actual retrieval performance affect cerebral activation in the elderly.
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Heun R, Freymann K, Erb M, Leube DT, Jessen F, Kircher TT, and Grodd W
- Subjects
- Aged, Aged, 80 and over, Analysis of Variance, Brain Mapping, Cerebral Cortex blood supply, Female, Humans, Magnetic Resonance Imaging methods, Male, Middle Aged, Neuropsychological Tests, Oxygen blood, Radiographic Image Interpretation, Computer-Assisted methods, Cerebral Cortex physiopathology, Cognition Disorders pathology, Cognition Disorders physiopathology, Geriatric Assessment, Mental Recall physiology, Recognition, Psychology physiology
- Abstract
Cerebral activation in the elderly may depend on general cognitive decline as well as actual retrieval performance. Consequently, activation between subjects with and without Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI), and between remembered and non-remembered words was compared. Twenty-one MCI and 29 healthy control subjects learned 180 nouns. During retrieval, subjects had to discriminate these and 180 distractor words. fMRI identified response-related activation. Most retrieval-related activation was comparable in both groups. However, MCI subjects showed more activation in the prefrontal cortex than controls during processing of hits and correct rejections. Hits showed increased activation than misses in the precuneus and left lateral parieto-occipital cortex; misses showed more activation than correct rejections in the precuneus to cuneus. Verbal retrieval activated a large common network in the elderly independently of MCI. Increased activation in MCI subjects in prefrontal cortex depends on response category. Activation differences between response categories might reflect success (hits) and effort (misses). Increased retrieval-related activation may be used as early marker in subjects at risk of Alzheimer's disease.
- Published
- 2007
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23. Laterality in metaphor processing: lack of evidence from functional magnetic resonance imaging for the right hemisphere theory.
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Rapp AM, Leube DT, Erb M, Grodd W, and Kircher TT
- Subjects
- Adult, Brain Mapping, Female, Frontal Lobe physiology, Hippocampus physiology, Humans, Judgment, Male, Nerve Net physiology, Recruitment, Neurophysiological physiology, Temporal Lobe physiology, Cerebral Cortex physiology, Comprehension physiology, Dominance, Cerebral physiology, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Metaphor
- Abstract
We investigated processing of metaphoric sentences using event-related functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). Seventeen healthy subjects (6 female, 11 male) read 60 novel short German sentence pairs with either metaphoric or literal meaning and performed two different tasks: judging the metaphoric content and judging whether the sentence has a positive or negative connotation. Laterality indices for 8 regions of interest were calculated: Inferior frontal gyrus (opercular part and triangular part), superior, middle, and inferior temporal gyrus, precuneus, temporal pole, and hippocampus. A left lateralised network was activated with no significant differences in laterality between the two tasks. The lowest degree of laterality was found in the temporal pole. Other factors than metaphoricity per se might trigger right hemisphere recruitment. Results are discussed in the context of lesion and hemifield studies.
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- 2007
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24. Neural correlates of metaphor processing in schizophrenia.
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Kircher TT, Leube DT, Erb M, Grodd W, and Rapp AM
- Subjects
- Female, Humans, Male, Metaphor, Middle Aged, Brain physiopathology, Language, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Mental Processes, Schizophrenia physiopathology
- Abstract
Objective: A main feature of schizophrenic thought and language disturbance is concretism, the inability to understand the figurative meaning of proverbs and metaphors. Although this is routinely tested during clinical interview, its neural basis is unknown., Method: We investigated processing of metaphoric sentences with functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) in 12 patients with schizophrenia and 12 control subjects. Stimuli consisted of 60 novel short sentences with either metaphoric or literal meaning presented visually, intersparsed by a low level baseline (grey background). Subjects read these sentences silently and judged by button press whether they had a positive or negative connotation., Results: Reading metaphors in contrast to literal sentences revealed signal changes in the left inferior frontal gyrus in the control subjects (BA 45/47) and an area 3 cm dorsal to that in the patients (BA 45). Only activation in this area was negatively correlated with the severity of concretism rated with the PANSS. Comparison between groups for the contrast metaphors vs. low level baseline revealed stronger signal changes in the control group in the right superior/middle temporal gyrus (BA 39) and the left inferior frontal gyrus (BA 45) in the patients., Conclusions: The results in the control subjects are in line with studies showing an involvement of the left inferior frontal and right lateral temporal cortex during context processing. Failure to recruit these areas in the patients may underlie schizophrenic concretism.
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- 2007
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25. Metacognition and reflexivity in patients with schizophrenia.
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Kircher TT, Koch K, Stottmeister F, and Durst V
- Subjects
- Adult, Character, Cognition Disorders psychology, Female, Humans, Judgment, Male, Mental Recall, Middle Aged, Psychiatric Status Rating Scales, Reaction Time, Self Concept, Statistics as Topic, Verbal Learning, Awareness, Cognition Disorders diagnosis, Schizophrenia diagnosis, Schizophrenic Psychology, Sick Role
- Abstract
Background: Many patients with schizophrenia demonstrate a lack of insight into their disorder and often do not complain about their cognitive impairments. This might be due to generally reduced metacognitive abilities., Sampling and Methods: Twenty-seven patients with a DSM IV diagnosis of schizophrenia and 19 healthy control subjects performed 2 separate tasks tapping into metacognitive functions. In the first experiment the participants encoded words. In the following recognition part they judged their level of subjective confidence in the correctness of their answer. In the second experiment reaction time was measured, whilst judgments were made about personality trait adjectives describing the subjects themselves or other familiar people., Results: Although the recognition rate in the first experiment was equal between the groups, the patients showed a significantly reduced ability to correctly judge their memory performance. There was no correlation between metamemory and psychopathology nor insight measures. The patients further needed significantly more time to characterize themselves compared to the healthy participants. The response rates for self-characterization correlated with the ability to recognize symptoms as part of a disorder but did not correlate with psychopathology., Conclusions: Metacognitive faculties seem to be, at least in part, a separable cognitive entity. Patients with schizophrenia demonstrate impaired metacognitive capacities, independent of current symptoms or memory performance., ((c) 2007 S. Karger AG, Basel.)
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- 2007
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26. Visualization and quantification of disease progression in multiple system atrophy.
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Hauser TK, Luft A, Skalej M, Nägele T, Kircher TT, Leube DT, and Schulz JB
- Subjects
- Aged, Brain Stem pathology, Caudate Nucleus pathology, Cerebellum pathology, Disease Progression, Dominance, Cerebral physiology, Female, Follow-Up Studies, Humans, Male, Mathematical Computing, Middle Aged, Putamen pathology, Brain pathology, Image Processing, Computer-Assisted, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Multiple System Atrophy diagnosis
- Abstract
To visualize and quantify disease progression in multiple system atrophy (MSA) from cerebellar type (MSA-C), we combined two magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) techniques, voxel-based morphometry (VBM) and 3D-based volumetry. Patients suffering from MSA-C (n = 14) were imaged twice with an interval of 2.0 +/- 0.2 years. We first applied VBM to map brain morphology changes between MSA patients and controls and to identify brain areas that showed a significant amount of atrophy. Using 3D-based volumetry, we confirmed that in MSA-C patients, the brainstem including medulla and pons, vermis and cerebellar hemispheres, caudate nucleus and putamen showed significant atrophy compared with controls. Next, we used 3D-based volumetry to analyze the atrophy rates. Atrophy rates in patients with MSA were significantly different from controls for putamen (-11.4% +/- 2.6%/year), vermis (-12.3% +/- 2.9%/year), and cerebellar hemispheres (-6.6% +/- 1.1%/year). The results show that 3D-based MRI volumetry is a tool that allows the disease progression of MSA to be followed over a time period of 2 years and suggest that it may serve as a surrogate marker in clinical trials to measure disease progression.
- Published
- 2006
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27. Successful verbal retrieval in elderly subjects is related to concurrent hippocampal and posterior cingulate activation.
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Heun R, Freymann K, Erb M, Leube DT, Jessen F, Kircher TT, and Grodd W
- Subjects
- Aged, Alzheimer Disease pathology, Alzheimer Disease psychology, Female, Gyrus Cinguli pathology, Hippocampus pathology, Humans, Image Processing, Computer-Assisted, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Male, Memory physiology, Neuropsychological Tests, Recognition, Psychology physiology, Temporal Lobe physiology, Gyrus Cinguli physiology, Hippocampus physiology, Mental Recall physiology
- Abstract
Objective: Memory decline and hippocampal atrophy are two major aspects of Alzheimer's disease. Using a response-related fMRI design, we investigated the relationship between successful verbal retrieval and concurrent cerebral activation in elderly subjects in different stages of cognitive decline. We chose a correlational over the more traditional categorical approach to increase the power of detecting relevant activations., Methods: Eleven subjects with Alzheimer's disease, 21 elderly subjects with mild cognitive impairment, and 29 age-matched cognitively unimpaired subjects learned 180 nouns. While measuring brain activation with fMRI, the subjects had to classify these 180 learned plus 180 new distractor words as known or new. Response-related fMRI analysis was used to identify cerebral activation by correctly remembered words (hits) that correlated with retrieval success in the whole group., Results: Successful verbal retrieval was significantly correlated with concurrent activation of the left hippocampus and posterior cingulate gyrus., Conclusion: The study confirms the importance of adequate hippocampal function for successful verbal retrieval in the elderly. In addition, our study supports connectivity studies indicating a functional relationship between the hippocampus and the posterior cingulate gyrus during successful verbal retrieval in the elderly in different stages of cognitive decline., (Copyright (c) 2006 S. Karger AG, Basel.)
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- 2006
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28. Cortical activation during cholinesterase-inhibitor treatment in Alzheimer disease: preliminary findings from a pharmaco-fMRI study.
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Kircher TT, Erb M, Grodd W, and Leube DT
- Subjects
- Aged, Aged, 80 and over, Alzheimer Disease physiopathology, Brain Mapping, Cerebral Cortex physiopathology, Cognition Disorders drug therapy, Cognition Disorders physiopathology, Dominance, Cerebral drug effects, Dominance, Cerebral physiology, Donepezil, Dose-Response Relationship, Drug, Drug Administration Schedule, Face, Female, Humans, Male, Memory, Short-Term drug effects, Memory, Short-Term physiology, Middle Aged, Pattern Recognition, Visual drug effects, Pattern Recognition, Visual physiology, Prosopagnosia physiopathology, Psychomotor Performance drug effects, Psychomotor Performance physiology, Alzheimer Disease drug therapy, Cerebral Cortex drug effects, Cholinesterase Inhibitors therapeutic use, Indans therapeutic use, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Piperidines therapeutic use, Prosopagnosia drug therapy
- Abstract
Objective: Cholinesterase inhibitors improve cognitive functioning in Alzheimer disease (AD). The authors studied, with functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), the neural mechanism by which this cholinergic enhancement improves memory encoding in AD over longer time periods., Methods: Brain activation was measured in 10 patients with AD and 10 healthy elderly comparison subjects with fMRI while they were encoding novel faces. Patients were scanned again after a 10-week open treatment with the cholinesterase-inhibitor donepezil., Results: Neuropsychologically-tested memory performance improved during the treatment phase in the patients. During the encoding of novel faces, elderly comparison subjects showed more activation in the right fusiform gyrus than the group of AD patients. After a 10-week treatment with donepezil, the fusiform gyrus was also activated in patients, similar to the comparison group., Conclusions: The right fusiform gyrus is associated with the processing of faces. Cholinergic enhancement augments selective attention by increased selectivity of perceptual responses in patients with AD. This mechanism may contribute to a more efficient processing of the attended stimulus and thus be a mechanism underlying clinical improvement of cognitive functioning. These promising preliminary findings need to be confirmed in a larger, controlled trial in which both fMRI and attention measures serve as outcomes.
- Published
- 2005
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29. Disorders of agency in schizophrenia correlate with an inability to compensate for the sensory consequences of actions.
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Lindner A, Thier P, Kircher TT, Haarmeier T, and Leube DT
- Subjects
- Adult, Case-Control Studies, Eye Movements, Female, Humans, Male, Neuropsychological Tests, Pattern Recognition, Visual, Perception, Delusions psychology, Motion Perception, Schizophrenic Psychology
- Abstract
Psychopathological symptoms in schizophrenia patients suggest that the concept of self might be disturbed in these individuals [1]. Delusions of influence make them feel that someone else is guiding their actions, and certain kinds of their hallucinations seem to be misinterpretations of their own inner voice as an external voice, the common denominator being that self-produced information is perceived as if coming from outside. If this interpretation were correct, we might expect that schizophrenia patients might also attribute the sensory consequences of their own eye movements to the environment rather than to themselves, challenging the percept of a stable world. Indeed, this seems to be the case because we found a clear correlation between the strength of delusions of influence and the ability of schizophrenia patients to cancel out such self-induced retinal information in motion perception. This correlation reflects direct experimental evidence supporting the view that delusions of influence in schizophrenia might be due to a specific deficit in the perceptual compensation of the sensory consequences of one's own actions [1, 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6].
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- 2005
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30. The influence of face similarity in the case of the perception of morphed self-face.
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Yoon HW and Kircher TT
- Subjects
- Adult, Female, Humans, Male, Reaction Time, Face, Facial Expression, Recognition, Psychology, Self Concept, Visual Perception
- Abstract
The purpose of the study was to examine if differences in behavioral effects in terms of facial self-recognition, compared to other identity recognition (familiar, strange) exist. Morphed versions of three facial identities were used in the experiment. The subject's own face was morphed with an unknown identity. A face of a highly familar person and of a stranger were also morphed in the same manner. This morphing procedure was repeated six times for each identity, but with six different unknown faces, in which three of the unknown faces were rated as being similar and the other three as dissimilar. The reaction times and categorical boundaries were then measured. The major finding of the study was that there were significant delayed mean reaction times for the morphed images of version "self versus similarly rated unknown faces" in contrast to the images of "self versus dissimilarly rated unknown faces" only. No significant differences were found in any of the other morphed versions. The authors interpret this result as being uniquely associated to the facial self-recognition and suggest that this association might be related to the "self effect."
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- 2005
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31. Neural correlates of syntax production in schizophrenia.
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Kircher TT, Oh TM, Brammer MJ, and McGuire PK
- Subjects
- Brain Mapping methods, Frontal Lobe physiopathology, Head Movements, Humans, Image Processing, Computer-Assisted methods, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Male, Risk Factors, Rorschach Test, Schizophrenia etiology, Semantics, Temporal Lobe physiopathology, Brain physiopathology, Schizophrenia physiopathology, Schizophrenic Language
- Abstract
Background: The production of grammatically complex sentences is impaired in schizophrenia. It has been suggested that impaired syntax processing reflects a risk for the disorder., Aims: To examine the neural correlates of syntax production in people with schizophrenia using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI)., Method: Six patients with schizophrenia and six healthy volunteers spoke about seven Rorschach inkblots for 3 min each while correlates of brain activation were measured with fMRI. Participants produced varying amounts of syntactically simple and complex sentences during each 3 min run. The number of simple and complex sentences was correlated separately with the BOLD contrast., Results: In the comparison between the control group and the patient group, the number of complex sentences produced was correlated with activation in the posterior portion of the right middle temporal (Brodmann area 21) and left superior frontal (BA10) gyriin the control group but not in the patients., Conclusions: The absence of activation in the right posterior temporal and left superior frontal cortex in patients with schizophrenia might contribute to the articulation of grammatically more simple speech in people with this disorder.
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- 2005
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32. Functional brain imaging of symptoms and cognition in schizophrenia.
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Kircher TT and Thienel R
- Subjects
- Brain diagnostic imaging, Brain pathology, Humans, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Positron-Emission Tomography, Brain physiopathology, Cognition, Schizophrenia diagnosis, Schizophrenia physiopathology, Schizophrenic Psychology
- Abstract
The advent of functional magnetic resonance imaging and positron emission tomography has provided novel insights into the neural correlates of cognitive function and psychopathological symptoms. In patients with mental disorders, cognitive and emotional processes are disrupted. In this chapter, we review the basic methodological and conceptual principles for neuroimaging studies in these patients. By taking schizophrenia as an example, we outline the cerebral processes involved in the symptoms of this disorder, such as auditory hallucinations and formal thought disorder. We also characterize the neural networks involved in their emotional and cognitive dysfunction.
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- 2005
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33. Deceiving oneself about being in control: conscious detection of changes in visuomotor coupling.
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Knoblich G and Kircher TT
- Subjects
- Adult, Cues, Female, Humans, Male, Reaction Time, Unconscious, Psychology, Deception, Psychomotor Performance, Self Concept, Signal Detection, Psychological, Visual Perception
- Abstract
Previous research has demonstrated that compensatory movements for changes in visuomotor coupling often are not consciously detected. But what factors affect the conscious detection of such changes? This issue was addressed in 4 experiments. Participants carried out a drawing task in which the relative velocity between the actual movement and its visual consequences was perturbed. Unconscious compensatory movements and conscious detection rates were simultaneously recorded. There was an invariant relationship between the extent of the change and its conscious detection that was proportional to the initial drawing velocity. This suggests that conscious change detection relies on a system that integrates visual and motor information-as, for instance, suggested by the internal model theory of motor control. Figural discrepancies increased the detection rates, indicating that additional cues for the what system facilitate conscious change detection.
- Published
- 2004
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34. Neural correlates of metaphor processing.
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Rapp AM, Leube DT, Erb M, Grodd W, and Kircher TT
- Subjects
- Adult, Female, Humans, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Male, Middle Aged, Reading, Cognition physiology, Frontal Lobe physiology, Metaphor, Semantics, Temporal Lobe physiology
- Abstract
Metaphoric language is used to express meaning that is otherwise difficult to conceptualize elegantly. Beyond semantic analysis, understanding the figurative meaning of a metaphor requires mental linkage of different category domains normally not related to each other. We investigated processing of metaphoric sentences using event-related functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). Stimuli consisted of 60 novel short German sentence pairs with either metaphoric or literal meaning. The pairs differed only in their last one to three words and were matched for syntax structure, word frequency, connotation and tense. Fifteen healthy subjects (six female, nine male, 19-51 years) read these sentences silently and judged by pressing one of two buttons whether they had a positive or negative connotation. Reading metaphors in contrast to literal sentences revealed signal changes in the left lateral inferior frontal (BA 45/47), inferior temporal (BA 20) and posterior middle/inferior temporal (BA 37) gyri. The activation in the left inferior frontal gyrus may reflect semantic inferencing processes during the understanding of a metaphor. This is in line with the results from other functional imaging studies showing an involvement of the left inferior frontal gyrus in integrating word and sentence meanings. Previous results of a right hemispheric involvement in metaphor processing might reflect understanding of complex sentences.
- Published
- 2004
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35. Mismatch negativity responses in schizophrenia: a combined fMRI and whole-head MEG study.
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Kircher TT, Rapp A, Grodd W, Buchkremer G, Weiskopf N, Lutzenberger W, Ackermann H, and Mathiak K
- Subjects
- Adult, Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Evoked Potentials, Auditory physiology, Female, Hemodynamics physiology, Humans, Male, Observer Variation, Oxygen blood, Schizophrenia diagnosis, Schizophrenia epidemiology, Brain blood supply, Brain metabolism, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Magnetoencephalography, Oxygen metabolism, Schizophrenia metabolism
- Abstract
Objective: Mismatch negativity is an event-related brain response sensitive to deviations within a sequence of repetitive auditory stimuli. It is thought to reflect short-term sensory memory and is independent of higher-level cognitive processes. Mismatch negativity response is diminished in patients with schizophrenia. Little is known about the mechanisms of this decreased response, the contribution of the different hemispheres, and its locus of generation., Method: Patients with schizophrenia (N=12) and matched comparison subjects (N=12) were studied. A novel design to measure mismatch negativity responses to deviant auditory stimuli was generated by using the switching noises from the functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) scanner, thus avoiding any interfering background sound. Stimuli included deviants of amplitude (9 dB lower) and duration (76 msec shorter) presented in a random sequence. The scanner noise was recorded and applied to the same subjects in a whole-head magnetoencephalography (MEG) device. Neuromagnetic and hemodynamic responses to the identical stimuli were compared between the patients and comparison subjects., Results: As expected, neuromagnetic mismatch fields were smaller in the patient group. More specifically, a lateralization to the right for duration deviance was only found in comparison subjects. For the relative amplitude of the blood-oxygen-level-dependent signal (measured with fMRI), differences emerged in the secondary (planum temporale), but not primary (Heschl's gyrus), auditory cortex. Duration deviants achieved a right hemispheric advantage only in the comparison group. A significantly stronger lateralization to the left was found for the deviant amplitude stimuli in the patients., Conclusions: The data support the view of altered hemispheric interactions in the formation of the short-term memory traces necessary for the integration of auditory stimuli. This process is predominantly mediated by the planum temporale (secondary auditory cortex). Altered interaction of regions within the superior temporal plane and across hemispheres could be in part responsible for language-mediated cognitive (e.g., verbal memory) and psychopathological (hallucinations, formal thought disorder) symptoms in schizophrenia.
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- 2004
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36. Pausing for thought: engagement of left temporal cortex during pauses in speech.
- Author
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Kircher TT, Brammer MJ, Levelt W, Bartels M, and McGuire PK
- Subjects
- Adult, Brain Mapping, Cerebellum physiology, Dominance, Cerebral physiology, Frontal Lobe physiology, Humans, Male, Nerve Net physiology, Oxygen Consumption physiology, Parietal Lobe physiology, Image Enhancement, Image Processing, Computer-Assisted, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Speech physiology, Temporal Lobe physiology, Thinking physiology, Verbal Behavior physiology
- Abstract
Pauses during continuous speech, particularly those that occur within clauses, are thought to reflect the planning of forthcoming verbal output. We used functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) to examine their neural correlates. Six volunteers were scanned while describing seven Rorschach inkblots, producing 3 min of speech per inkblot. In an event-related design, the level of blood oxygenation level dependent (BOLD) contrast during brief speech pauses (mean duration 1.3 s, SD 0.3 s) during overt speech was contrasted with that during intervening periods of articulation. We then examined activity associated with pauses that occurred within clauses and pauses that occurred between grammatical junctions. Relative to articulation during speech, pauses were associated with activation in the banks of the left superior temporal sulcus (BA 39/22), at the temporoparietal junction. Continuous speech was associated with greater activation bilaterally in the inferior frontal (BA 44/45), middle frontal (BA 8) and anterior cingulate (BA 24) gyri, the middle temporal sulcus (BA 21/22), the occipital cortex and the cerebellum. Left temporal activation was evident during pauses that occurred within clauses but not during pauses at grammatical junctions. In summary, articulation during continuous speech involved frontal, temporal and cerebellar areas, while pausing was associated with activity in the left temporal cortex, especially when this occurred within a clause. The latter finding is consistent with evidence that within-clause pauses are a correlate of speech planning and in particular lexical retrieval.
- Published
- 2004
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37. Successful episodic memory retrieval of newly learned faces activates a left fronto-parietal network.
- Author
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Leube DT, Erb M, Grodd W, Bartels M, and Kircher TT
- Subjects
- Adult, Face, Female, Humans, Learning physiology, Magnetic Resonance Imaging methods, Male, Photic Stimulation methods, Reaction Time physiology, Recognition, Psychology physiology, Frontal Lobe physiology, Functional Laterality physiology, Memory physiology, Nerve Net physiology, Parietal Lobe physiology
- Abstract
It is easier to recognize a familiar face than a newly learned face. The neural basis of familiar face recognition has been elucidated in functional imaging and lesion studies. Behavioural and neuropsychological data indicate, however, that brain systems involved in episodic retrieval of familiar and newly learned faces are distinct. In our study, 12 subjects viewed 30 novel faces in an encoding session. In the study condition, event-related functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) was used to compare brain activation during correct recognition of the recently learned faces to that observed during correct rejection of unknown control faces. Differences were present in the left inferior parietal (BA 40) and left medial frontal/anterior cingulate (BA 32/9) cortex. These two regions may be part of a pathway in the dorsal visual stream, responsible for a "feeling of familiarity" in contrast to the ventral pathway in the temporal lobes, which is mainly involved in the recognition of personal identity.
- Published
- 2003
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38. Self-consciousness, self-agency, and schizophrenia.
- Author
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Kircher TT and Leube DT
- Subjects
- Awareness physiology, Brain physiopathology, Brain Mapping, Hallucinations diagnosis, Hallucinations physiopathology, Hallucinations psychology, Humans, Intention, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Perceptual Distortion physiology, Personal Construct Theory, Psychomotor Performance physiology, Schizophrenia diagnosis, Cognition physiology, Consciousness physiology, Ego, Internal-External Control, Schizophrenia physiopathology, Schizophrenic Psychology
- Abstract
Empirical approaches on topics such as consciousness, self-awareness, or introspective perspective, need a conceptual framework so that the emerging, still unconnected findings can be integrated and put into perspective. We introduce a model of self-consciousness derived from phenomenology, philosophy, the cognitive, and neurosciences. We will then give an overview of research data on one particular aspect of our model, self-agency, trying to link findings from cognitive psychology and neuroscience. Finally, we will expand on pathological aspects of self-agency, and in particular on psychosis in schizophrenia. We show, that a deficient self-monitoring system underlies, in part, hallucinations and formal thought (language) disorder in schizophrenia. We argue, that self-consciousness is a valid construct and can be studied with the instruments of cognitive and neuroscience.
- Published
- 2003
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39. The neural correlates of perceiving one's own movements.
- Author
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Leube DT, Knoblich G, Erb M, Grodd W, Bartels M, and Kircher TT
- Subjects
- Adult, Basal Ganglia physiology, Cerebellum physiology, Feedback physiology, Humans, Image Interpretation, Computer-Assisted, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Motor Cortex physiology, Oxygen blood, Motion Perception physiology, Movement physiology, Psychomotor Performance physiology
- Abstract
Feedforward mechanisms are important for movement control. They may also contribute to the identification of self-produced actions by attenuating the sensory consequences of self-produced movements. In our study, subjects opened and closed their hand slowly and continuously (0.5 Hz). This movement was filmed with an MRI compatible video camera and projected online onto a screen, viewed by the subject while BOLD contrast was measured with fMRI. The temporal delay between movement and feedback was parametrically varied (0-200 ms). In each trial, subjects judged whether there was a delay or not. There was a positive correlation between the extent of the temporal delay and activation in the right posterior superior temporal cortex (pSTS) and a negative correlation in the left putamen. A second analysis addressed the neural correlates of subjective judgement under conditions of uncertainty. This contrast showed a differential activation in the cerebellum. These results support the assumption of a forward model implying that predictions generated in motor areas attenuate sensory areas. They also suggest that efference copy mechanisms are not located within specific brain areas but are implemented as a specific form of interaction between perceptual and motor areas depending on the modalities and the type of actions involved. Further, conscious detection of small temporal deviations might be based on signals generated in the cerebellum which provide fine-grained temporal information. These results might be useful to refine theories about the role of forward mechanisms in the emergence of disorders of the self, such as in schizophrenia.
- Published
- 2003
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40. Observing one's hand become anarchic: an fMRI study of action identification.
- Author
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Leube DT, Knoblich G, Erb M, and Kircher TT
- Subjects
- Awareness physiology, Body Image, Brain Mapping, Concept Formation physiology, Dominance, Cerebral physiology, Humans, Intention, Nerve Net physiology, Personal Construct Theory, Problem Solving physiology, Cerebral Cortex physiology, Cognition physiology, Consciousness physiology, Ego, Functional Laterality physiology, Image Processing, Computer-Assisted, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Perceptual Distortion physiology, Psychomotor Performance physiology
- Abstract
The self seems to be a unitary entity remaining stable across time. Nevertheless, current theorizing conceptualizes the self as a number of interacting sub-systems involving perception, intention and action (self-model). One important function of such a self-model is to distinguish between events occurring as a result of one's own actions and events occurring as the result of somebody else's actions. We conducted an fMRI experiment that compared brain activation after an abrupt mismatch between one's own movement and its visual consequences with an abrupt mismatch between one's own movement and somebody else's visually perceived hand movement. A right fronto-parietal network was selectively active during a sudden mismatch between one's own observed and performed hand action.
- Published
- 2003
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41. Hippocampal dysfunction during episodic memory encoding in patients with schizophrenia-an fMRI study.
- Author
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Leube DT, Rapp A, Buchkremer G, Bartels M, Kircher TT, Erb M, and Grodd W
- Subjects
- Adult, Attention physiology, Brain Mapping, Dominance, Cerebral physiology, Echo-Planar Imaging, Face, Female, Humans, Male, Reference Values, Schizophrenia diagnosis, Hippocampus physiopathology, Image Processing, Computer-Assisted, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Memory, Short-Term physiology, Pattern Recognition, Visual physiology, Schizophrenia physiopathology, Schizophrenic Psychology
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- 2003
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42. Brain regions sensitive to the face inversion effect: a functional magnetic resonance imaging study in humans.
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Leube DT, Yoon HW, Rapp A, Erb M, Grodd W, Bartels M, and Kircher TT
- Subjects
- Adult, Brain anatomy & histology, Brain Mapping, Dominance, Cerebral, Female, Humans, Male, Pattern Recognition, Visual physiology, Photic Stimulation, Brain physiology, Facial Expression, Magnetic Resonance Imaging methods, Recognition, Psychology physiology
- Abstract
Perception of upright faces relies on configural processing. Therefore recognition of inverted, compared to upright faces is impaired. In a functional magnetic resonance imaging experiment we investigated the neural correlate of a face inversion task. Thirteen healthy subjects were presented with a equal number of upright and inverted faces alternating with a low level baseline with an upright and inverted picture of an abstract symbol. Brain activation was calculated for upright minus inverted faces. For this differential contrast, we found a signal change in the right superior temporal sulcus and right insula. Configural properties are processed in a network comprising right superior temporal and insular cortex.
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- 2003
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43. Mismatch responses to randomized gradient switching noise as reflected by fMRI and whole-head magnetoencephalography.
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Mathiak K, Rapp A, Kircher TT, Grodd W, Hertrich I, Weiskopf N, Lutzenberger W, and Ackermann H
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- Acoustic Stimulation, Attention physiology, Auditory Cortex anatomy & histology, Cerebrovascular Circulation physiology, Electroencephalography, Humans, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Magnetoencephalography, Schizophrenia diagnosis, Schizophrenia physiopathology, Artifacts, Auditory Cortex physiology, Auditory Pathways physiology, Evoked Potentials, Auditory physiology, Functional Laterality physiology, Reaction Time physiology, Sound Localization physiology
- Abstract
The central auditory system of the human brain uses a variety of mechanisms to analyze auditory scenes, among others, preattentive detection of sudden changes in the sound environment. Electroencephalography (EEG) and magnetoencephalography (MEG) provide a measure to monitor neuronal cortical currents. The mismatch negativity (MMN) or field (MMNm) reflect preattentive activation in response to deviants within a sequence of homogenous auditory stimuli. Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) allows for a higher spatial resolution as compared to the extracranial electrophysiological techniques. The image encoding gradients of echo planar imaging (EPI) sequences, however, elicit an interfering background noise. To circumvent this shortcoming, the present study applied multi-echo EPI mimicking an auditory oddball design. The gradient trains (SOA = 800 msec, 94.5 dB SPL, stimulus duration = 152 msec) comprised amplitude (-9 dB) and duration (76 msec) deviants in a randomized sequence. Moreover, the scanner noise was recorded and applied in a whole-head MEG device to validate the properties of this specific material. Robust fMRI activation patterns emerged in response to the deviant gradient switching. Changes in amplitude activated the entire auditory cortex, whereas the duration deviants elicited right-lateralized signal increase in secondary areas. The recorded scanner noise evoked reliably right-lateralized mismatch MEG responses. Source localization was in accordance with activation of secondary auditory cortex. The presented paradigm provides a robust and feasible tool to study the functional anatomy of early cognitive auditory processing in clinical populations such as schizophrenia., (Copyright 2002 Wiley-Liss, Inc.)
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- 2002
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44. Reversed lateralization of temporal activation during speech production in thought disordered patients with schizophrenia.
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Kircher TT, Liddle PF, Brammer MJ, Williams SC, Murray RM, and McGuire PK
- Subjects
- Adult, Brain Mapping, Humans, Image Enhancement, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Male, Middle Aged, Oxygen Consumption physiology, Schizophrenia diagnosis, Schizophrenic Psychology, Arousal physiology, Dominance, Cerebral physiology, Schizophrenia physiopathology, Schizophrenic Language, Temporal Lobe physiology, Thinking physiology, Verbal Behavior physiology
- Abstract
Background: Formal thought disorder is a core symptom of schizophrenia. It is associated with a reversed lateralization of the superior temporal cortex volume, an area that is implicated in lexical retrieval. We investigated the neural correlates of word retrieval during continuous speech in patients with formal thought disorder using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI)., Methods: Blood oxygenation level dependent (BOLD) contrast was measured with fMRI while six patients with schizophrenia and six healthy control subjects spoke about seven Rorschach inkblots for 3 min each. Subjects produced varying amounts of speech during each run. In a within subject design, the number of words produced was correlated with the BOLD contrast in the two runs in each participant who showed the highest variance of speech output., Results: In control subjects, the amount of speech produced was mainly correlated with activation in the left superior temporal gyrus. In the patient group, the main correlations were in the right superior temporal gyrus., Conclusions: During the production of continuous speech, patients with formal thought disorder showed a reversed laterality of activation in the superior temporal cortex. This is consistent with findings of perturbed hemispheric interaction in schizophrenia, particularly in patients with formal thought disorder.
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- 2002
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45. The neural correlates of intentional and incidental self processing.
- Author
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Kircher TT, Brammer M, Bullmore E, Simmons A, Bartels M, and David AS
- Subjects
- Adult, Awareness physiology, Brain Mapping, Humans, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Male, Prefrontal Cortex physiology, Self-Assessment, Brain physiology, Ego, Self Concept
- Abstract
The neuroscientific study of the 'Self' is just beginning to emerge. We used functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) to investigate cerebral activation while subjects processed words describing personality traits and physical features, in two experiments with contrasting designs: incidental and intentional. In the first experiment (intentional self processing), subjects were presented with personality trait adjectives and made judgements as to their self descriptiveness (versus non self descriptiveness). In the second experiment (incidental self processing), subjects categorised words according to whether they described physical versus psychological attributes, while unaware that the words had been arranged in blocks according to self descriptiveness. The subjects had previously rated all words for self descriptiveness 6 weeks prior to the scanning session. A reaction time advantage was present in both experiments for self descriptive trait words, suggesting a facilitation effect. Common areas of activation for the two experiments included the left superior parietal lobe, with adjacent regions of the lateral prefrontal cortex also active in both experiments. Differential signal changes were present in the left precuneus for the intentional and the right middle temporal gyrus for the incidental experiment. The results suggest that self processing involves distinct processes and can occur on more than one cognitive level with corresponding functional neuroanatomic correlates in areas previously implicated in the awareness of one's own state.
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- 2002
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46. Activation of right fronto-temporal cortex characterizes the 'living' category in semantic processing.
- Author
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Leube DT, Erb M, Grodd W, Bartels M, and Kircher TT
- Subjects
- Adult, Data Interpretation, Statistical, Decision Making physiology, Female, Humans, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Male, Semantics, Frontal Lobe physiology, Functional Laterality physiology, Mental Processes physiology, Temporal Lobe physiology
- Abstract
It is a vital ability for humans to distinguish between living and non-living objects. Whether the semantic features of these two classes of objects are represented in distinct brain areas, is unknown. In our study, words belonging to the categories 'living' and 'non-living' were presented visually to twelve right-handed volunteers, while brain activation was measured with event-related fMRI. Subjects had to judge whether the item belonged to one of these categories. Common areas of activation (P<0.05, corrected) during processing of both categories include the inferior occipital gyri bilaterally (BA 17/18), left inferior frontal gyrus (BA 44/45) and left inferior parietal lobe (BA 40). During processing of 'living' minus 'non-living' items, signal changes (P<0.05, corrected) were present in the the right inferior frontal (BA 47), middle temporal (BA 21) and fusiform gyrus (BA 19). Our results are in line with findings from patients with a deficit in semantic processing of living things, who specifically suffer from right hemispheric lesions.
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- 2001
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47. Differential activation in parahippocampal and prefrontal cortex during word and face encoding tasks.
- Author
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Leube DT, Erb M, Grodd W, Bartels M, and Kircher TT
- Subjects
- Adult, Face, Female, Functional Laterality physiology, Humans, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Male, Nerve Net physiology, Parahippocampal Gyrus anatomy & histology, Photic Stimulation, Reaction Time physiology, Recognition, Psychology physiology, Parahippocampal Gyrus physiology, Pattern Recognition, Visual physiology, Prefrontal Cortex physiology, Verbal Behavior physiology, Word Association Tests
- Abstract
Episodic encoding is the first step in the formation of a memory trace. The relation between type of stimulus material and regional brain activation is not fully understood. We measured brain activation using fMRI in 12 healthy subjects during two experiments, word and face encoding. A widespread network of common activations in both tasks was present in the bilateral frontal (BA44/45), occipital (BA17/18/19) and fusiform gyri (BA37) as well as the right hippocampal formation (BA30). A region-of-interest-analysis for the hippocampal formation and dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) was performed additionally. During face encoding the right dorsal and during word encoding the bilateral ventral hippocampal region was activated. In the prefrontal cortex a lateralization to the left side was present only for word encoding. During encoding, activation in the inferior frontal and hippocampal cortex is modulated by the type of stimulus material.
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- 2001
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48. Neural correlates of formal thought disorder in schizophrenia: preliminary findings from a functional magnetic resonance imaging study.
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Kircher TT, Liddle PF, Brammer MJ, Williams SC, Murray RM, and McGuire PK
- Subjects
- Adult, Brain blood supply, Brain physiopathology, Caudate Nucleus blood supply, Caudate Nucleus physiology, Cerebellum blood supply, Cerebellum physiology, Humans, Male, Oxygen blood, Regional Blood Flow, Rorschach Test, Schizophrenia physiopathology, Severity of Illness Index, Temporal Lobe blood supply, Temporal Lobe physiology, Brain physiology, Magnetic Resonance Imaging statistics & numerical data, Schizophrenia diagnosis, Schizophrenic Psychology, Speech physiology
- Abstract
Background: Formal thought disorder (FTD) is a core symptom of schizophrenia, but its pathophysiology is little understood. We examined the neural correlates of FTD using functional magnetic resonance imaging., Methods: Blood oxygenation level-dependent contrast was measured using functional magnetic resonance imaging while 6 patients with schizophrenia and 6 control subjects spoke about 7 Rorschach inkblots for 3 minutes each. In patients, varying degrees of thought-disordered speech were elicited during each "run." In a within-subject design, the severity of positive FTD was correlated with the level of blood oxygenation level-dependent contrast in the 2 runs that showed the highest variance of FTD in each patient., Results: The severity of positive FTD in patients was negatively correlated (P<.001) with signal changes in the left superior and middle temporal gyri. Positive correlations were evident in the cerebellar vermis, the right caudate body, and the precentral gyrus., Conclusions: The severity of positive FTD was inversely correlated with the level of activity in the Wernicke area, a region implicated in the production of coherent speech. Reduced activity in this area might contribute to the articulation of incoherent speech. Because of the small sample size, these findings should be considered preliminary.
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- 2001
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49. Differential activation of temporal cortex during sentence completion in schizophrenic patients with and without formal thought disorder.
- Author
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Kircher TT, Bulimore ET, Brammer MJ, Williams SC, Broome MR, Murray RM, and McGuire PK
- Subjects
- Acute Disease, Adult, Humans, Image Processing, Computer-Assisted, Language Tests, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Male, Neuropsychological Tests, Psychiatric Status Rating Scales, Psychotic Disorders diagnosis, Psychotic Disorders etiology, Reaction Time, Schizophrenia physiopathology, Severity of Illness Index, Temporal Lobe physiopathology, Cognition Disorders diagnosis, Cognition Disorders etiology, Schizophrenia diagnosis, Temporal Lobe anatomy & histology, Thinking, Verbal Behavior physiology
- Abstract
The neural correlates of processing linguistic context in schizophrenic patients with formal thought disorder (FTD) were examined. Six right-handed male patients with prominent 'positive' FTD were compared with six schizophrenic patients without FTD and seven volunteers, matched for cognitive and demographic variables. Functional magnetic resonance imaging (IMRI) was used to measure cerebral activation while subjects read and completed sentence stems out loud. During a GENERATION condition, subjects were required to generate a word which completed the sentence stem appropriately. During a DECISION condition, subjects selected and articulated one of two presented terminal words. A READING condition served as baseline. The three conditions were compared with each other. Regions activated were identified in each group, and between-group differences were detected using an ANCOVA. When GENERATION was compared with READING, FTD patients showed less activation in the right superior temporal gyrus than patients without FTD or controls, but greater activation in the left inferior frontal, inferior temporal and fusiform gyri. FTD patients also showed an attenuated right temporal response when GENERATION was compared with DECISION. This differential engagement of the right temporal cortex was independent of differences in the speed or accuracy of responses, whereas the left fronto-temporal differences in activation were not evident after covarying for task errors. The attenuated engagement of right temporal cortex, which is implicated in language comprehension at the discourse level, is consistent with neuropsychological evidence linking thought disorder with deficits in processing linguistic context.
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- 2001
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50. Recognizing one's own face.
- Author
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Kircher TT, Senior C, Phillips ML, Rabe-Hesketh S, Benson PJ, Bullmore ET, Brammer M, Simmons A, Bartels M, and David AS
- Subjects
- Adult, Brain metabolism, Female, Humans, Male, Nerve Net, Reaction Time, Visual Perception, Brain blood supply, Dominance, Cerebral, Face, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Recognition, Psychology, Self Concept
- Abstract
We report two studies of facial self-perception using individually tailored, standardized facial photographs of a group of volunteers and their partners. A computerized morphing procedure was used to merge each target face with an unknown control face. In the first set of experiments, a discrimination task revealed a delayed response time for the more extensively morphed self-face stimuli. In a second set of experiments, functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) was used to measure brain activation while subjects viewed morphed versions of either their own or their partner's face, alternating in blocks with presentation of an unknown face. When subjects viewed themselves (minus activation for viewing an unknown face), increased blood oxygenation was detected in right limbic (hippocampal formation, insula, anterior cingulate), left prefrontal cortex and superior temporal cortex. In the partner (versus unknown) experiment, only the right insula was activated. We suggest that a neural network involving the right hemisphere in conjunction with left-sided associative and executive regions underlies the process of visual self-recognition. Together, this combination produces the unique experience of self-awareness.
- Published
- 2001
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
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