title: Aberrant amygdala intrinsic functional connectivity distinguishes youths with bipolar disorder from those with severe mood dysregulation.
abstract: It remains unclear the degree to which youths with episodic mania (bipolar disorder; BD) vs. those with chronic, severe irritability (severe mood dysregulation, SMD) should be placed in similar or distinct diagnostic groups. Addressing this clinically meaningful question requires greater understanding of the neural alterations underlying both disorders. We evaluated resting state functional magnetic resonance imaging data of 53 youths (14 BD, 20 healthy volunteers (HV), and 19 SMD, ages 9-18.5 years). Seed regions of interest were the bilateral basolateral, superficial and centromedial amygdala, defined using the Juelich probabilistic atlas. We found a significant between-group difference in functional connectivity between the left basolateral amygdala and the medial aspect of the left frontal pole plus the posterior cingulate/precuneus. This finding was driven by hyperconnectivity among BD vs. HV or SMD youths. As with earlier data, these findings suggest that the pathophysiology of BD and SMD may differ.
authors.affiliation: Section on Bipolar Spectrum Disorders, Emotion and Development Branch, National Institute of Mental Health, National Institutes of Health, Department of Health and Human Services, Bethesda, MD, USA. Electronic address: joel.stoddard@nih.gov.
authors.forename: Joel
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Stoddard
authors.affiliation: Section on Bipolar Spectrum Disorders, Emotion and Development Branch, National Institute of Mental Health, National Institutes of Health, Department of Health and Human Services, Bethesda, MD, USA.
authors.forename: Derek
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Hsu
authors.affiliation: Scientific and Statistical Computing Core, National Institute of Mental Health, National Institutes of Health, Department of Health and Human Services, Bethesda, MD, USA.
authors.forename: Richard C
authors.initials: RC
authors.lastname: Reynolds
authors.affiliation: Section on Bipolar Spectrum Disorders, Emotion and Development Branch, National Institute of Mental Health, National Institutes of Health, Department of Health and Human Services, Bethesda, MD, USA.
authors.forename: Melissa A
authors.initials: MA
authors.lastname: Brotman
authors.affiliation: Section on Development and Affective Neuroscience, Emotion and Development Branch, National Institute of Mental Health, National Institutes of Health, Department of Health and Human Services, Bethesda, MD, USA.
authors.forename: Monique
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Ernst
authors.affiliation: Section on Development and Affective Neuroscience, Emotion and Development Branch, National Institute of Mental Health, National Institutes of Health, Department of Health and Human Services, Bethesda, MD, USA.
authors.forename: Daniel S
authors.initials: DS
authors.lastname: Pine
authors.affiliation: Section on Bipolar Spectrum Disorders, Emotion and Development Branch, National Institute of Mental Health, National Institutes of Health, Department of Health and Human Services, Bethesda, MD, USA.
authors.forename: Ellen
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Leibenluft
authors.affiliation: PediMIND Program, Department of Psychiatry & Human Behavior, Alpert Medical School of Brown University, Providence, RI, USA.
authors.forename: Daniel P
authors.initials: DP
authors.lastname: Dickstein
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000679:Amygdala / Q000503:physiopathology*; D001714:Bipolar Disorder / Q000503:physiopathology*; D001931:Brain Mapping / Q000379:methods*; D002540:Cerebral Cortex / Q000503:physiopathology*; D002648:Child; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007508:Irritable Mood / Q000502:physiology*; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging; D008297:Male; D009415:Nerve Net / Q000503:physiopathology*; D010641:Phenotype
keywords: Bipolar disorder; Child; Functional connectivity; Irritability; Magnetic resonance imaging