The purposes of this study are to explore functional alterations in salience network (SN) and its functional coupling with default mode (DMN) and central executive (CEN) networks in minimal hepatic encephalopathy (MHE). Twenty cirrhotic patients with MHE, 23 cirrhotic patients without MHE (NHE), and 18 controls underwent resting-state fMRI and psychometric hepatic encephalopathy score (PHES) test. Independent component analysis was performed to obtain DMN (including three subsystems: anterior, inferior-posterior, and superior-posterior DMN [a/ip/spDMN]), SN, and CEN (including three subsystems: left-ventral, right-ventral, and dorsal CEN [lv/rv/dCEN]). The intrinsic functional connectivity (iFC) within (intra-iFC) and between (inter-iFC and time-lagged inter-iFC) networks was measured. MHE patients showed decreased intra-iFC within aDMN, SN, lvCEN, and rvCEN; and decreased inter-iFC and time-lagged inter-iFC between SN and ipDMN/spDMN/lvCEN and increased inter-iFC and time-lagged inter-iFC between SN and aDMN, compared with controls. A progressive trend in connectivity alterations was found as the disease developed from NHE to MHE. The inter-iFC between ipDMN/spDMN and SN was significantly correlated with PHES score. In conclusion, an aberrant SN and its functional interaction with the DMN/CEN are core features of MHE that are associated with disease progression and may play an important role in neurocognitive dysfunction in MHE.
Introducing additional Sn into polycrystalline Ag8SnSe6 could manipulate self-defects and improve the crystallinity, and the peak ZT value is significantly improved.
Lower DKI parameters suggest decreased brain microstructural complexity in patients with cirrhosis, which may contribute to the neurobiologic basis of cognitive impairment.
Objective: Patients with cirrhosis often exhibit cognitive deficits, particularly executive dysfunction, which is considered a predictor of overt hepatic encephalopathy (OHE). We examined brain intrinsic networks associated with executive function to investigate the neural basis of this cognitive deficiency in cirrhosis.
Methods:Resting-state functional MRI data were acquired from 20 cirrhotic patients and 18 healthy controls. Seed-based correlation analysis was used to identify the three well-known networks associated with executive function, including executive control (ECN), default mode (DMN), and salience (SN) networks. Functional connectivity (FC) within each network was compared between groups and correlated with patient executive performance (assessed by the Stroop task).results: Patients showed decreased FC between the ECN seed (right dorsolateral prefrontal cortex) and several regions (including right middle/inferior frontal gyrus, left inferior frontal gyrus, bilateral inferior/superior parietal lobules, bilateral middle/inferior temporal gyrus, and right medial frontal gyrus), between the DMN seed [posterior cingulate cortex (PCC)] and several regions (including bilateral medial frontal gyrus, bilateral anterior cingulate cortex, bilateral superior frontal gyrus, bilateral precuneus/PCC, left supramarginal gyrus, and left middle temporal gyrus), and between the SN seed (right anterior insula) and right supramarginal gyrus. FC strength in the ECN and SN was negatively correlated with patient performance during the Stroop task.conclusion: Disrupted functional integration in the core brain cognitive networks, which is reflected by reductions in FC, occurs before OHE bouts and may play an important role in the neural mechanism of executive dysfunction associated with cirrhosis.
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