Larger amygdala volumes in first depressive episode as compared to recurrent major depression and healthy control subjects

Enhanced rostral anterior cingulate cortex activation during cognitive control is related to orbitofrontal volume reduction in unipolar depression

“…MacQueen and colleagues 40 found a significant logarithmic association and Sheline and colleagues 41 a significant linear association between hippocampus volume and total illness duration. However, other studies 35,38,42 did not find any association between clinical variables and decreased volume in the hippocampus or amygdala. For the OFC, in agreement with our study, Bremner and colleagues 22 and Lacerda and colleagues 28 reported no significant association between OFC volume decrease and clinical variables.…”

“…Alternatively, Pizzagalli and colleagues 32 did not find any morphometric differences in the subgenual ACC in melancholic as well as in nonmelancholic depression subjects relative to healthy control subjects, but did find a reduced resting-state metabolism and increased delta activity only in patients with melancholic depression. Whereas some studies on amygdala volume in MDD patients revealed glial cell and volume reductions, 33,34 Frodl and colleagues 35 demonstrated an increased amygdala volume in patients with a first depressive episode in comparison with patients with recurrent MDD and healthy control subjects, as well as no differences between the latter 2 groups.…”

Patterns of gene expression in the limbic system of suicides with and without major depression

“…5 Neuroimaging studies have produced a substantial body of knowledge about alterations of the limbic system in mood disorders. In the amygdala, alterations in cerebral blood flow and metabolism, 6 asymmetry of amygdalar volumes, 7 as well as smaller [8][9][10] and larger volumes [11][12][13][14] have been observed in depressed subjects when compared with normal controls. In the hippocampus, volumetric analysis studies have also revealed reduced volumes in subjects suffering from major depression in some, 7,11,[14][15][16][17][18][19][20] but not all studies 10,[21][22][23] comparing depressed patients versus controls.…”

Brain anatomy of major depression II. Focus on amygdala

“…However, other structural investigations have shown preserved volumes (Mervaala et al 2000;Munn et al 2007;MacMaster et al 2008), mainly in current non-suicidal patients (Monkul et al 2007), in non-psychotic depressed patients (Keller et al 2008) or in recovered patients (van Eijndhoven et al 2009;Lorenzetti et al 2010). Moreover, enlarged amygdalar volumes have also been reported (van Elst et al 2000), particularly in subjects using antidepressants (Frodl et al 2003;Weniger et al 2006) (Frodl et al 2003(Frodl et al , 2008aLange & Irle, 2004;Lorenzetti et al 2010;Weniger et al 2006). In summary, although there is some evidence that amygdalar size is reduced in MDD patients, particularly in those with recurrent episodes (Hamilton et al 2008;Lorenzetti et al 2009), preserved and increased volumes have also been reported.…”