[Cortical activation induced by intraoral stimulation with water in humans with functional magnetic resonance imaging].
OBJECTIVE
To investigate the neural representations of normal humans intraoral water stimulation using non-invasive functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) measurement, provide information for intraoral thermosensory study.


METHODS
13 healthy right-handed subjects (of which 6 were males) participated in the study to receive 23 degrees C deionized distilled water stimuli in mouth. The experimental protocol consisted of a block-design using 5 stimulus. Water stimuli were delivered to the subject's mouth through self-made polythene tubes that were held between lips. Functional MRI scan covering the whole brain was carried out. The fMRI data was analyzed by SPM99 software with statistic t-test to generate the activation map.


RESULTS
Significant activations existed in peri-sylvian including pre/ post-central gyrus, insular, orbitalfrontal cortex (OFC), anterior cingulate cortex (ACC), frontal gyrus, parietal lobule, midbrain and parietal lobule.


CONCLUSIONS
Water's ability to activate nonspecific somatosensory, thermal or taste processing. The findings highlight the complex and distributed processing of different aspects of intraoral perception, and emphasize the importance of controlling for the effects of water when investigating the functional neuroanatomy of taste or temperature.
Yang
Xiu-wen
XW
Dept. of Stomatology, The PLA General Hospital, Beijing 100853, China.
Liu
Hong-chen
HC
Jin
Zhen
Z
Li
Ke
K
D000328:Adult; D001921:Brain; D002540:Cerebral Cortex; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging; D008297:Male; D014867:Water
D014867:Water