N-acetylaspartate reductions in the mediodorsal and anterior thalamus in men with schizophrenia verified by tissue volume corrected proton MRSI

Jakary, Angela; Vinogradov, Sophia; Feiwell, Robert; Deicken, Raymond F.

doi:10.1016/j.schres.2005.02.012

« Previous Next »Schizophrenia Research
Volume 76, Issue 2 , Pages 173-185, 15 July 2005

N-acetylaspartate reductions in the mediodorsal and anterior thalamus in men with schizophrenia verified by tissue volume corrected proton MRSI

Angela Jakary
- Psychiatry Service, 116-N, Veterans Affairs Medical Center, 4150 Clement Street, San Francisco, CA 94121, USA
Sophia Vinogradov
- Psychiatry Service, 116-N, Veterans Affairs Medical Center, 4150 Clement Street, San Francisco, CA 94121, USA
- Department of Psychiatry, University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) School of Medicine, San Francisco, CA, USA
Robert Feiwell
- Department of Radiology, University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) School of Medicine, San Francisco, CA, USA
Raymond F. Deicken
- Psychiatry Service, 116-N, Veterans Affairs Medical Center, 4150 Clement Street, San Francisco, CA 94121, USA
- Department of Psychiatry, University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) School of Medicine, San Francisco, CA, USA
- Corresponding author. Psychiatry Service, 116-N, Veterans Affairs Medical Center, 4150 Clement Street, San Francisco, CA 94121, USA. Tel.: +1 415 221 4810x4350; fax: +1 415 750 6648.

Received 20 October 2004; received in revised form 17 February 2005; accepted 21 February 2005.

Abstract

Objective

Deficits in the mediodorsal and anterior nuclei of the thalamus may contribute to the psychopathological symptoms of schizophrenia. These thalamic nuclei have been found to be abnormal in schizophrenia and have close connections with other brain structures implicated in the disorder. We therefore examined schizophrenia-related alterations in brain metabolite levels specifically in the mediodorsal and anterior thalamic subregions.

Method

We used in vivo proton magnetic resonance spectroscopic imaging (¹H MRSI) to measure N-acetylaspartate (NAA), choline-containing compounds (Cho), and creatine+phosphocreatine (Cr) in the mediodorsal and anterior thalamus in 22 male patients with schizophrenia and 22 male controls. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) tissue segmentation and thalamic volume mask techniques were performed to distinguish the thalamus, extrathalamic gray and white matter, and CSF within the spectroscopic voxels.

Results

Compared to healthy subjects, patients with schizophrenia had significantly lower NAA in the mediodorsal and anterior thalamus bilaterally. No significant differences in Cho or Cr levels were seen. NAA was significantly higher in the left thalamus relative to the right in both groups. We found a strong negative correlation between left thalamic NAA and duration of illness, even after partialling out the effect of age. Tissue segmentation and thalamic volume mask techniques detected no group or lateralized differences in tissue type or CSF percentages, demonstrating that the metabolite reductions were not an artifact of spectroscopic voxel heterogeneity.

Conclusions

These findings suggest diminished function and/or structure in the mediodorsal and anterior thalamus in male patients with schizophrenia and support earlier research demonstrating schizophrenia-related abnormalities in the thalamus and its circuitry.

Keywords: Brain, Thalamus, Magnetic resonance spectroscopy, Schizophrenia, N-acetylaspartate