title: Patients with chronic visceral pain show sex-related alterations in intrinsic oscillations of the resting brain.
abstract: Abnormal responses of the brain to delivered and expected aversive gut stimuli have been implicated in the pathophysiology of irritable bowel syndrome (IBS), a visceral pain syndrome occurring more commonly in women. Task-free resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) can provide information about the dynamics of brain activity that may be involved in altered processing and/or modulation of visceral afferent signals. Fractional amplitude of low-frequency fluctuation is a measure of the power spectrum intensity of spontaneous brain oscillations. This approach was used here to identify differences in the resting-state activity of the human brain in IBS subjects compared with healthy controls (HCs) and to identify the role of sex-related differences. We found that both the female HCs and female IBS subjects had a frequency power distribution skewed toward high frequency to a greater extent in the amygdala and hippocampus compared with male subjects. In addition, female IBS subjects had a frequency power distribution skewed toward high frequency in the insula and toward low frequency in the sensorimotor cortex to a greater extent than male IBS subjects. Correlations were observed between resting-state blood oxygen level-dependent signal dynamics and some clinical symptom measures (e.g., abdominal discomfort). These findings provide the first insight into sex-related differences in IBS subjects compared with HCs using resting-state fMRI.
authors.affiliation: Gail and Gerald Oppenheimer Family Center for Neurobiology of Stress, University of California, Los Angeles, California 90095, USA.
authors.forename: Jui-Yang
authors.initials: JY
authors.lastname: Hong
authors.forename: Lisa A
authors.initials: LA
authors.lastname: Kilpatrick
authors.forename: Jennifer
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Labus
authors.forename: Arpana
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Gupta
authors.forename: Zhiguo
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Jiang
authors.forename: Cody
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Ashe-McNalley
authors.forename: Jean
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Stains
authors.forename: Nuwanthi
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Heendeniya
authors.forename: Bahar
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Ebrat
authors.forename: Suzanne
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Smith
authors.forename: Kirsten
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Tillisch
authors.forename: Bruce
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Naliboff
authors.forename: Emeran A
authors.initials: EA
authors.lastname: Mayer
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D001921:Brain / Q000503:physiopathology*; D001931:Brain Mapping; D058256:Brain Waves / Q000502:physiology*; D059350:Chronic Pain / Q000503:physiopathology*; D004569:Electroencephalography; D005260:Female; D059907:Functional Neuroimaging; D006801:Humans; D007091:Image Processing, Computer-Assisted; D043183:Irritable Bowel Syndrome / Q000503:physiopathology*; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009415:Nerve Net / Q000503:physiopathology; D017288:Pain Threshold / Q000502:physiology; D010812:Physical Stimulation; D012727:Sex Characteristics; D012737:Sex Factors; D017833:Visceral Afferents / Q000503:physiopathology; D059265:Visceral Pain / Q000503:physiopathology*