TY - JOUR
T1 - Mapping cortical activations underlying covert and overt language production using high-density diffuse optical tomography
AU - Schroeder, Mariel L.
AU - Sherafati, Arefeh
AU - Ulbrich, Rachel L.
AU - Wheelock, Muriah D.
AU - Svoboda, Alexandra M.
AU - Klein, Emma D.
AU - George, Tessa G.
AU - Tripathy, Kalyan
AU - Culver, Joseph P.
AU - Eggebrecht, Adam T.
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2023 The Author(s)
PY - 2023/8/1
Y1 - 2023/8/1
N2 - Gold standard neuroimaging modalities such as functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), positron emission tomography (PET), and more recently electrocorticography (ECoG) have provided profound insights regarding the neural mechanisms underlying the processing of language, but they are limited in applications involving naturalistic language production especially in developing brains, during face-to-face dialogues, or as a brain-computer interface. High-density diffuse optical tomography (HD-DOT) provides high-fidelity mapping of human brain function with comparable spatial resolution to that of fMRI but in a silent and open scanning environment similar to real-life social scenarios. Therefore, HD-DOT has potential to be used in naturalistic settings where other neuroimaging modalities are limited. While HD-DOT has been previously validated against fMRI for mapping the neural correlates underlying language comprehension and covert (i.e., “silent”) language production, HD-DOT has not yet been established for mapping the cortical responses to overt (i.e., “out loud”) language production. In this study, we assessed the brain regions supporting a simple hierarchy of language tasks: silent reading of single words, covert production of verbs, and overt production of verbs in normal hearing right-handed native English speakers (n = 33). First, we found that HD-DOT brain mapping is resilient to movement associated with overt speaking. Second, we observed that HD-DOT is sensitive to key activations and deactivations in brain function underlying the perception and naturalistic production of language. Specifically, statistically significant results were observed that show recruitment of regions in occipital, temporal, motor, and prefrontal cortices across all three tasks after performing stringent cluster-extent based thresholding. Our findings lay the foundation for future HD-DOT studies of imaging naturalistic language comprehension and production during real-life social interactions and for broader applications such as presurgical language assessment and brain-machine interfaces.
AB - Gold standard neuroimaging modalities such as functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), positron emission tomography (PET), and more recently electrocorticography (ECoG) have provided profound insights regarding the neural mechanisms underlying the processing of language, but they are limited in applications involving naturalistic language production especially in developing brains, during face-to-face dialogues, or as a brain-computer interface. High-density diffuse optical tomography (HD-DOT) provides high-fidelity mapping of human brain function with comparable spatial resolution to that of fMRI but in a silent and open scanning environment similar to real-life social scenarios. Therefore, HD-DOT has potential to be used in naturalistic settings where other neuroimaging modalities are limited. While HD-DOT has been previously validated against fMRI for mapping the neural correlates underlying language comprehension and covert (i.e., “silent”) language production, HD-DOT has not yet been established for mapping the cortical responses to overt (i.e., “out loud”) language production. In this study, we assessed the brain regions supporting a simple hierarchy of language tasks: silent reading of single words, covert production of verbs, and overt production of verbs in normal hearing right-handed native English speakers (n = 33). First, we found that HD-DOT brain mapping is resilient to movement associated with overt speaking. Second, we observed that HD-DOT is sensitive to key activations and deactivations in brain function underlying the perception and naturalistic production of language. Specifically, statistically significant results were observed that show recruitment of regions in occipital, temporal, motor, and prefrontal cortices across all three tasks after performing stringent cluster-extent based thresholding. Our findings lay the foundation for future HD-DOT studies of imaging naturalistic language comprehension and production during real-life social interactions and for broader applications such as presurgical language assessment and brain-machine interfaces.
KW - Articulation
KW - Covert
KW - High-density diffuse optical tomography
KW - Naturalistic language
KW - Overt
KW - Speech
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85160272969&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2023.120190
DO - 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2023.120190
M3 - Article
C2 - 37245559
AN - SCOPUS:85160272969
SN - 1053-8119
VL - 276
JO - NeuroImage
JF - NeuroImage
M1 - 120190
ER -