No association between hair cortisol or cortisone and brain morphology in children.
Little is known about the relationship between the long-term hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis functioning and brain structure in children. Glucocorticoid in hair has emerged as an important biomarker of HPA activity. In this study, we investigated the associations of hair cortisol and cortisone concentrations with brain morphology in young children. We included 219 children aged 6-10 years from the Generation R Study in Rotterdam, the Netherlands. We examined cortisol and cortisone concentrations by hair analysis using liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry, and assessed brain morphometric measures with structural magnetic resonance imaging. The relationships of hair cortisol and cortisone concentrations with brain volumetrics, cortical thickness, cortical surface area and gyrification were analyzed separately after adjustment for several potential confounding factors. We observed a positive association between cortisol concentrations and cortical surface area in the parietal lobe, positive associations of cortisone concentrations with thalamus volume, occipital lobe volume and cortical surface area in the parietal lobe, and a negative association between cortisone concentrations and cortical surface area in the temporal lobe in the regions of interest analyses. A negative association between cortisol or cortisone concentrations and hippocampal volume was observed in children with behavioral problems. The whole brain vertex-wise analyses did however not show any association between cortisol or cortisone concentration and brain morphometric measures after correction for multiple testing. Although some associations are noted in region of interest analyses, we do not observe clear association of hair cortisol or cortisone with brain morphometric measures in typically developing young children.
Department of Medical Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden; Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Erasmus University Medical Center, Rotterdam, The Netherlands.
Ruoqing
R
Chen
Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Erasmus University Medical Center, Rotterdam, The Netherlands; The Generation R Study Group, Erasmus University Medical Center, Rotterdam, The Netherlands.
Ryan L
RL
Muetzel
Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Erasmus University Medical Center, Rotterdam, The Netherlands; The Generation R Study Group, Erasmus University Medical Center, Rotterdam, The Netherlands.
Hanan
H
El Marroun
Department of Internal Medicine, Division of Endocrinology, Erasmus University Medical Center, Rotterdam, The Netherlands; Department of Pediatrics, Erasmus University Medical Center, Rotterdam, The Netherlands.
Gerard
G
Noppe
Department of Internal Medicine, Division of Endocrinology, Erasmus University Medical Center, Rotterdam, The Netherlands.
Elisabeth F C
EF
van Rossum
The Generation R Study Group, Erasmus University Medical Center, Rotterdam, The Netherlands; Department of Pediatrics, Erasmus University Medical Center, Rotterdam, The Netherlands; Department of Epidemiology, Erasmus University Medical Center, Rotterdam, The Netherlands.
Vincent W
VW
Jaddoe
Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Erasmus University Medical Center, Rotterdam, The Netherlands.
Frank C
FC
Verhulst
Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Erasmus University Medical Center, Rotterdam, The Netherlands; Department of Radiology, Erasmus University Medical Center, Rotterdam, The Netherlands.
Tonya
T
White
Department of Medical Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden.
Fang
F
Fang
Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Erasmus University Medical Center, Rotterdam, The Netherlands; Department of Epidemiology, Erasmus University Medical Center, Rotterdam, The Netherlands. Electronic address: h.tiemeier@erasmusmc.nl.
Henning
H
Tiemeier
D002540:Cerebral Cortex / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging*; D002648:Child; D002652:Child Behavior / Q000502:physiology*; D003348:Cortisone / Q000032:analysis*; D005260:Female; D006197:Hair / Q000737:chemistry*; D006624:Hippocampus / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging*; D006801:Humans; D006854:Hydrocortisone / Q000032:analysis*; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging; D008297:Male; D009426:Netherlands; D000066553:Problem Behavior; D053719:Tandem Mass Spectrometry; D013788:Thalamus / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging*
D003348:Cortisone; D006854:Hydrocortisone
Brain morphology; Child; Cortisol; Cortisone; Hair