A cognitive map is an internal model of the world's causal structure, crucial for adaptive behaviors. The orbitofrontal cortex (OFC) is central node to decision-making and cognitive map representation. However, it remains unclear how the medial OFC (mOFC) and lateral OFC (lOFC) contribute to the formation of cognitive maps in humans.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFFish consumption can increase purine load in human body, and the enrichment of mercury in fish may affect the glomerular filtration function, both resulting in increased serum uric acid (SUA) levels. The data of blood mercury (BHg), fish consumption frequency and SUA levels of 7653 participants aged 18 years or older was from China National Human Biomonitoring (2017-2018). The associations between fish consumption frequency, ln-transformed BHg and SUA levels were explored through weighted multiple linear regressions.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThere has been widespread concern about the health hazards of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), which may be the risk factor for hyperuricemia with evidence still insufficient in the general population in China. Here, we conducted a nationwide study involving 9,580 adults aged 18 years or older from 2017 to 2018, measured serum concentrations of uric acid and PFAS (PFOA, PFOS, 6:2 Cl-PFESA, PFNA, PFHxS) in participants, to assess the associations of individual PFAS with hyperuricemia, and estimated a joint effect of PFAS mixtures. We found positive associations of higher serum PFAS with elevated odds of hyperuricemia in Chinese adults, with the greatest contribution from PFOA (69.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFWhat Is Already Known About This Topic?: Antimony (Sb) has been identified as a new neurotoxicant that impacts neurological functions in animal studies. However, its effects on the human population remain unknown.
What Is Added By This Report?: The study reveals that there is an association between exposure to Sb and a higher incidence of cognitive impairment in older adults.
Inferring prospective outcomes and updating behavior are prerequisites for making flexible decisions in the changing world. These abilities are highly associated with the functions of the orbitofrontal cortex (OFC) in humans and animals. The functional specialization of OFC subregions in decision-making has been established in animals.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: Perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substance (PFAS) has endocrine-disrupting properties and may affect blood pressure. Endogenous hormones also play a crucial role in the progression of hypertension. However, their interaction with hypertension remains to be explored.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFHow does the human brain construct cognitive maps for decision-making and inference? Here, we conduct an fMRI study on a navigation task in multidimensional abstract spaces. Using a deep neural network model, we assess learning levels and categorized paths into exploration and exploitation stages. Univariate analyses show higher activation in the bilateral hippocampus and lateral prefrontal cortex during exploration, positively associated with learning level and response accuracy.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFPrevious research has suggested that certain types of the affective temperament, including depressive, cyclothymic, hyperthymic, irritable, and anxious, are subclinical manifestations and precursors of mental disorders. However, the neural mechanisms that underlie these temperaments are not fully understood. The aim of this study was to identify the brain regions associated with different affective temperaments.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFInconsistent results have been reported regarding the association between low-to-moderate arsenic (As) exposure and diabetes. The effect of liver dysfunction on As-induced diabetes remains unclear. The cross-sectional study included 10,574 adults from 2017-2018 China National Human Biomonitoring.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe hippocampus (HC) and the orbitofrontal cortex (OFC) jointly encode a map-like representation of a task space to guide behavior. It remains unclear how the OFC and HC interact in encoding this map-like representation, though previous studies indicated that both regions have different functions. We acquired the functional magnetic resonance imaging data under a social navigation task in which participants interacted with characters in a two-dimensional "social space.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFWhat Is Already Known About This Topic?: Previous research indicates that non-occupational physical activity can reduce mortality risk. Nevertheless, the relationship between occupational physical activity and health improvements has not been consistently established.
What Is Added By This Report?: The study found that regular exercise and leisure activities reduced the risk of all-cause mortality.
Background: Major depressive and social anxiety disorders have a high comorbidity rate and similar cognitive patterns. However, their unique and shared neuroanatomical characteristics have not been fully identified.
Methods: Voxel-based morphometric studies comparing gray matter volume between patients with major depressive disorder/social anxiety disorder and healthy controls were searched using 4 electronic databases from the inception to March 2022.
Introduction: Evidence from previous genetic and post-mortem studies suggested that the myelination abnormality contributed to the pathogenesis of major depressive disorder (MDD). However, image-level alterations in cortical myelin content associated with MDD are still unclear.
Methods: The high-resolution T1-weighted (T1w) and T2-weighted (T2w) brain 3D structural images were obtained from 52 MDD patients and 52 healthy controls (HC).
Background: Multi-modal magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) measures are supposed to be able to capture different brain neurobiological aspects of major depressive disorder (MDD). A fusion analysis of structural and functional modalities may better reveal the disease biomarker specific to the MDD disease.
Methods: We recruited 30 MDD patients and 30 matched healthy controls (HC).
Introduction: About half of adults aged ≥80 years suffer from frailty. Exercise is considered effective in preventing frailty but may be inapplicable to adults aged ≥80 years due to physical limitations. As an alternative, we aimed to explore the association of leisure activities with frailty and identify potential interaction with established polygenic risk score (PRS) among adults aged ≥80 years.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFDisorders of consciousness are impaired states of consciousness caused by severe brain injuries. Previous resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging studies have reported abnormal brain network properties at different topological scales in patients with disorders of consciousness by using graph theoretical analysis. However, it is still unclear how inter-regional directed propagation activities affect the topological organization of functional brain networks in patients with disorders of consciousness.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFSocial navigation is a dynamic and complex process that requires the collaboration of multiple brain regions. However, the neural networks for navigation in a social space remain largely unknown. This study aimed to investigate the role of hippocampal circuit in social navigation from a resting-state fMRI data.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: The association between fine particular matter (PM2.5) and frailty is less studied, and the national burden of PM2.5-related frailty in China is unknown.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFChina CDC Wkly
December 2022
What Is Already Known About This Topic?: Environmental and occupational lead exposure has generally declined in the past two decades. However, there is no large-scale monitoring of blood lead levels (BLLs) in the Chinese general population.
What Is Added By This Report?: This nationally representative study showed declines of BLLs in all ages of participants; for children aged 3-5 years, down from 78.