title: Combination of event-related potentials and functional magnetic resonance imaging during single-letter reading.
abstract: This work proposes a mathematical approach for combining event-related potentials (ERPs) and functional magnetic resonance images (fMRI). Data were separately recorded during the same event-related experimental design, consisting of visually presented single letters and non-alphabetic symbols, that had to be either simply observed (passive condition) or read aloud (active condition). This protocol was useful for exploring the neural correlates of reading processes. Healthy adults participated in the experiment. Averaged ERPs were decomposed by independent component analysis; low resolution electromagnetic tomography (LORETA) was applied to estimate the current density distribution maps of each independent component. fMRI images time series were analyzed by multiple linear regression. ERP-fMRI correspondence was quantified by computing the Euclidean distance between LORETA local maxima and clusters of significantly activated fMRI voxels. During reading aloud of letters, that is clearly the task most similar to natural reading conditions, significant electrical and hemodynamic response was observed in the left medial frontal gyrus (BA 6) and left middle temporal gyrus (BA 22/39) just before articulation and in the bilateral middle superior temporal gyrus (BA 22/37) during and after verbal-motor production. These results indicate that the middle-superior temporal gyrus plays a crucial and multifunctional role in grapheme-phoneme matching.
authors.affiliation: Department of Bioengineering, Polytechnic University of Milan, Milan, Italy. silvia.casarotto@polimi.it
authors.forename: Silvia
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Casarotto
authors.forename: Anna M
authors.initials: AM
authors.lastname: Bianchi
authors.forename: Sergio
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Cerutti
authors.forename: Nicola
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Vanello
authors.forename: Emiliano
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Ricciardi
authors.forename: Claudio
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Gentili
authors.forename: Lorenzo
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Sani
authors.forename: Daniela
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Bonino
authors.forename: Mario
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Guazzelli
authors.forename: Pietro
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Pietrini
authors.forename: Luigi
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Landini
authors.forename: Giuseppe A
authors.initials: GA
authors.lastname: Chiarenza
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000465:Algorithms; D001921:Brain / Q000502:physiology*; D001931:Brain Mapping / Q000379:methods*; D004569:Electroencephalography / Q000379:methods*; D005071:Evoked Potentials / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007802:Language; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging / Q000379:methods*; D008297:Male; D010364:Pattern Recognition, Visual / Q000502:physiology*; D011932:Reading; D013647:Task Performance and Analysis