Regional glucose metabolism within cortical Brodmann areas in healthy individuals and autistic patients.
A new Brodmann area (BA) delineation approach was applied to FDG-PET scans of autistic patients and healthy volunteers (n = 17 in each group) to examine relative glucose metabolism (rGMR) during performance of a verbal memory task. In the frontal lobe, patients had lower rGMR in medial/cingulate regions (BA 32, 24, 25) but not in lateral regions (BA 8-10) compared with healthy controls. Patients had higher rGMR in occipital (BA 19) and parietal regions (BA 39) compared with controls, but there were no group differences in temporal lobe regions. Among controls, better recall and use of the semantic-clustering strategy was associated with greater lateral and medial frontal rGMR, while decreased rGMR in medial-frontal regions was associated with greater perseverative/intrusion errors. Patients failed to show these patterns. Autism patients have dysfunction in some but not all of the key brain regions subserving verbal memory performance, and other regions may be recruited for task performance.
Hazlett
Erin A
EA
Department of Psychiatry, Mount Sinai School of Medicine, New York, N.Y., USA. erin.hazlett@mssm.edu
Buchsbaum
Monte S
MS
Hsieh
Pauline
P
Haznedar
M Mehmet
MM
Platholi
Jimcy
J
LiCalzi
Elizabeth M
EM
Cartwright
Charles
C
Hollander
Eric
E
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D001321:Autistic Disorder / Q000378:metabolism*; D001786:Blood Glucose / Q000378:metabolism*; D001931:Brain Mapping; D016022:Case-Control Studies; D002540:Cerebral Cortex / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging / Q000378:metabolism*; D004734:Energy Metabolism; D005260:Female; D019788:Fluorodeoxyglucose F18; D007839:Functional Laterality / Q000502:physiology; D006801:Humans; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging / Q000379:methods; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests; D014055:Tomography, Emission-Computed / Q000379:methods; D014706:Verbal Learning / Q000502:physiology
D001786:Blood Glucose; D019788:Fluorodeoxyglucose F18