TY - JOUR
T1 - Sex differences of gray matter morphology in cortico-limbic-striatal neural system in major depressive disorder
AU - Kong, Lingtao
AU - Chen, Kaiyuan
AU - Womer, Fay
AU - Jiang, Wenyan
AU - Luo, Xingguang
AU - Driesen, Naomi
AU - Liu, Jie
AU - Blumberg, Hilary
AU - Tang, Yanqing
AU - Xu, Ke
AU - Wang, Fei
N1 - Funding Information:
This work was supported by the National Institute of Health (NIH) [ K01MH086621 to F.W.]; the National Alliance for Research on Schizophrenia and Depression (Great Neck, NY) [F.W.]; the Klingenstein Foundation [F.W.]; the National Natural Science Foundation of China ( 81071099 and 81271499 to Y.T.) and the Liaoning Science and Technology Foundation ( 2008225010-14 to Y.T.).
PY - 2013/6
Y1 - 2013/6
N2 - Sex differences are observed in both epidemiological and clinical aspects of major depressive disorder (MDD). The cortico-limbic-striatal neural system, including the prefrontal cortex, amygdala, hippocampus, and striatum, have shown sexually dimorphic morphological features and have been implicated in the dysfunctional regulation of mood and emotion in MDD. In this study, we utilized a whole-brain, voxel-based approach to examine sex differences in the regional distribution of gray matter (GM) morphological abnormalities in medication-naïve participants with MDD. Participants included 29 medication-naïve individuals with MDD (16 females and 13 males) and 33 healthy controls (HC) (17 females and 16 males). Gray matter morphology of the cortico-limbic-striatal neural system was examined using voxel-based morphometry analyzes of high-resolution structural magnetic resonance imaging scans. The main effect of diagnosis and interaction effect of diagnosis by sex on GM morphology were statistically significant (. p < 0.05, corrected) in the left ventral prefrontal cortex, right amygdala, right hippocampus and bilateral caudate when comparing the MDD and HC groups. Posthoc analyzes showed that females with MDD had significant GM decreases in limbic regions (. p < 0.05, corrected), compared to female HC; while males with MDD demonstrated significant GM reduction in striatal regions, (. p < 0.05, corrected), compared to HC males. The observed sex-related patterns of abnormalities within the cortico-limbic-strial neural system, such as predominant prefrontal-limbic abnormalities in MDD females vs. predominant prefrontal-striatal abnormalities in MDD males, suggest differences in neural circuitry that may mediate sex differences in the clinical presentation of MDD and potential targets for sex-differentiated treatment of the disorder.
AB - Sex differences are observed in both epidemiological and clinical aspects of major depressive disorder (MDD). The cortico-limbic-striatal neural system, including the prefrontal cortex, amygdala, hippocampus, and striatum, have shown sexually dimorphic morphological features and have been implicated in the dysfunctional regulation of mood and emotion in MDD. In this study, we utilized a whole-brain, voxel-based approach to examine sex differences in the regional distribution of gray matter (GM) morphological abnormalities in medication-naïve participants with MDD. Participants included 29 medication-naïve individuals with MDD (16 females and 13 males) and 33 healthy controls (HC) (17 females and 16 males). Gray matter morphology of the cortico-limbic-striatal neural system was examined using voxel-based morphometry analyzes of high-resolution structural magnetic resonance imaging scans. The main effect of diagnosis and interaction effect of diagnosis by sex on GM morphology were statistically significant (. p < 0.05, corrected) in the left ventral prefrontal cortex, right amygdala, right hippocampus and bilateral caudate when comparing the MDD and HC groups. Posthoc analyzes showed that females with MDD had significant GM decreases in limbic regions (. p < 0.05, corrected), compared to female HC; while males with MDD demonstrated significant GM reduction in striatal regions, (. p < 0.05, corrected), compared to HC males. The observed sex-related patterns of abnormalities within the cortico-limbic-strial neural system, such as predominant prefrontal-limbic abnormalities in MDD females vs. predominant prefrontal-striatal abnormalities in MDD males, suggest differences in neural circuitry that may mediate sex differences in the clinical presentation of MDD and potential targets for sex-differentiated treatment of the disorder.
KW - Amygdala
KW - Caudate
KW - Hippocampus
KW - Magnetic resonance imaging
KW - Major depressive disorder
KW - Voxel-based morphometry
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84875902997&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.jpsychires.2013.02.003
DO - 10.1016/j.jpsychires.2013.02.003
M3 - Article
C2 - 23453566
AN - SCOPUS:84875902997
VL - 47
SP - 733
EP - 739
JO - Journal of Psychiatric Research
JF - Journal of Psychiatric Research
SN - 0022-3956
IS - 6
ER -