title: Catechol-O-methyltransferase val158met genotype influences neural processing of reward anticipation.
abstract: Reward processing depends critically on dopaminergic neurotransmission in the ventral striatum. The common polymorphism val(158)met of catechol-O-methyltransferase (COMT) accounts for significant interindividual variations in dopamine (DA) degradation, although the direct effect of COMT on striatal DA might be limited. Using fMRI we assessed the influence of COMT val(158)met genotype on brain activations elicited by the anticipation of monetary gains and losses in forty-four healthy volunteers. We found that the met(158) allele, which is presumably linked to higher synaptic DA levels, was associated with higher responses in ventral striatum to loss incentives. There was a linear relationship between the number of met(158) alleles and ventral striatal activity. Furthermore, we observed a similar gene-dose effect in the anterior temporal cortex, a region that has been linked to the coupling of sensory information with emotional contents. Temporal cortex also showed enhanced connectivity to the ventral striatum during the processing of incentive stimuli. Increased ventral striatal reactivity to loss incentives related to the met(158) allele might contribute to the observed association of the met(158) allele to higher loss aversion behaviour. Current evidence and our results are compatible with an interpretation that construes this effect of COMT genotype on striatal reactivity as a result of a cortico-striatal interaction.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Charité University Medicine, Charitéplatz 1, 10117 Berlin, Germany. katharina.schmack@charite.de
authors.forename: Katharina
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Schmack
authors.forename: Florian
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Schlagenhauf
authors.forename: Philipp
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Sterzer
authors.forename: Jana
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Wrase
authors.forename: Anne
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Beck
authors.forename: Theresa
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Dembler
authors.forename: Peter
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Kalus
authors.forename: Imke
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Puls
authors.forename: Thomas
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Sander
authors.forename: Andreas
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Heinz
authors.forename: Jürgen
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Gallinat
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D001288:Attention / Q000502:physiology*; D002394:Catechol O-Methyltransferase / Q000235:genetics*; D002540:Cerebral Cortex / Q000502:physiology*; D003342:Corpus Striatum / Q000502:physiology*; D005071:Evoked Potentials / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D005838:Genotype; D006801:Humans; D019545:Intuition / Q000502:physiology*; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging; D008297:Male; D012201:Reward
chemical_list: D002394:Catechol O-Methyltransferase