Disorganized thalamic subregional functional connectivity in bipolar I disorder

Area of Science:

• Neuroimaging
• Psychiatry
• Neuroscience

Background:

• The thalamus is crucial in neuropsychiatric disorders due to its extensive connections.
• Its role in bipolar disorder (BD) remains incompletely understood.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate the involvement of the thalamus and its subregions in bipolar disorder (BD).
• To compare functional and structural connectivity of the thalamus between BD patients and healthy controls.

Main Methods:

• Functional and structural magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) was used.
• Seed-based analysis examined thalamic and subregional functional connectivity (FC).
• 73 adult patients with BD-I and 78 healthy controls (HCs) participated.

Main Results:

• BD-I patients exhibited higher FC between the left thalamus and right lingual gyrus compared to HCs.
• Altered FC was observed between the dorsal thalamus and default mode network/prefrontal regions in BD-I.
• The anterior thalamus showed higher FC than posterior subregions in BD-I patients.
• No significant differences in gray matter volume or local activity were found.

Conclusions:

• Disorganized thalamocortical FC is evident in bipolar disorder (BD-I).
• The thalamus and its subregions play specific roles in the neural circuitry of BD.
• Altered FC may correlate with mania symptoms.