title: White matter microstructure between the pre-SMA and the cingulum bundle is related to response conflict in healthy subjects.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Response conflict involves selectively attending to relevant information and suppressing distracting, irrelevant information. The medial frontal cortex (MFC) is considered to be involved in response conflict. However, it remains unclear which white matter connectivity is associated with response conflict. This study aimed to delineate the neural connectivity of response conflict in healthy subjects and investigate the association between white matter microstructure and performance of a response conflict task.
  
  
  METHODS
  Twenty-eight healthy subjects underwent functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) during the Flanker task and diffusion MRI. We identified the presupplementary motor area (pre-SMA) using fMRI. Furthermore, we delineated the white matter connectivity between the pre-SMA and the cingulum bundle (CB), which is located in the MFC, using probabilistic tractography. We calculated the mean diffusivity (MD), index of white matter microstructure, of this tract and evaluate the association between MD and performance of the Flanker task.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The mean MD of this tract was significantly and positively associated with performance of the Flanker task.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The present study suggests the white matter connectivity between the pre-SMA and the CB is related to the response conflict in healthy subjects and finer white matter microstructure is associated with smaller response conflict.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry Graduate School of Medicine Nagoya University Nagoya Aichi Japan.
authors.forename: Maeri
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Yamamoto
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry Graduate School of Medicine Nagoya University Nagoya Aichi Japan ; Institute for Advanced Research Nagoya University Nagoya Aichi Japan.
authors.forename: Itaru
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Kushima
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry Graduate School of Medicine Nagoya University Nagoya Aichi Japan.
authors.forename: Hiroki
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Kimura
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry Graduate School of Medicine Nagoya University Nagoya Aichi Japan.
authors.forename: Akiko
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Hayashi
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry Graduate School of Medicine Nagoya University Nagoya Aichi Japan ; Institute of Innovation for Future Society Nagoya University Nagoya Aichi Japan.
authors.forename: Naoko
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Kawano
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry Graduate School of Medicine Nagoya University Nagoya Aichi Japan.
authors.forename: Branko
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Aleksic
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry Graduate School of Medicine Nagoya University Nagoya Aichi Japan.
authors.forename: Tetsuya
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Iidaka
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry Graduate School of Medicine Nagoya University Nagoya Aichi Japan.
authors.forename: Norio
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Ozaki
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D001288:Attention / Q000502:physiology; D001931:Brain Mapping; D063132:Connectome; D056324:Diffusion Tensor Imaging / Q000379:methods; D005260:Female; D006179:Gyrus Cinguli / Q000033:anatomy & histology* / Q000502:physiology*; D006801:Humans; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009044:Motor Cortex / Q000502:physiology; D017397:Prefrontal Cortex / Q000033:anatomy & histology* / Q000502:physiology*; D013329:Structure-Activity Relationship; D066127:White Matter / Q000033:anatomy & histology* / Q000502:physiology*
keywords: Attention; connectivity; diffusion tractography; fractional anisotropy; functional MRI