College of Liberal Arts & Sciences
Math Biology Seminar
Abstract:
Understanding neural circuits that support mood is a central goal of affective neuroscience, and improved understanding of the anatomy could inform more targeted interventions in mood disorders. Lesion studies provide a method of inferring the anatomical sites causally related to specific functions, including mood. Here, we will discuss a large-scale study evaluating the location of acquired, focal brain lesions in relation to symptoms of depression. Multivariate lesion-symptom mapping was performed to identify lesion sites associated with higher or lower depression symptom burden, which we refer to as “risk” versus “resilience” regions. The brain networks and white matter tracts associated with peak regional findings were identified using functional and structural lesion network mapping, respectively. Lesion-symptom mapping identified brain regions significantly associated with both higher and lower depression severity. These results demonstrate that lesions to specific nodes of the salience network and default mode network are associated with greater risk versus resiliency for depression symptoms in the setting of focal brain lesions.