Glucocorticoids and their receptors (GRs) are implicated in dynamic cognitive and neuroendocrine processes mediated by the prefrontal cortex and hippocampus. Additionally, a primary defect in forebrain GR levels can mimic symptoms of depression. We hypothesized that changes in GR mRNA levels may occur in the human brain across the life span thus positioning GR to differentially influence behavior and disease susceptibility. Following in situ hybridization with a riboprobe for human GR mRNA, we employed quantitative film autoradiography to measure expression levels in the prefrontal cortex and hippocampus in five age groups (infants, adolescents, young adults, adults, and aged) and in primary visual and visual association cortices for comparison. We detected a main effect of age group on cortical, but not hippocampal GR mRNA, with greater cortical expression in adolescents and adults than in infants or the aged. Increased GR mRNA in prefrontal cortex during adolescence and adulthood suggests that human GR-mediated forebrain regulation of cognition and the neuroendocrine stress response may be more salient during late maturation and at maturity.
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http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.neurobiolaging.2006.01.010 | DOI Listing |
Elife
January 2025
Department of Neurology, TUM School of Medicine and Health, Technical University of Munich (TUM), Munich, Germany.
Chronic pain is a prevalent and debilitating condition whose neural mechanisms are incompletely understood. An imbalance of cerebral excitation and inhibition (E/I), particularly in the medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC), is believed to represent a crucial mechanism in the development and maintenance of chronic pain. Thus, identifying a non-invasive, scalable marker of E/I could provide valuable insights into the neural mechanisms of chronic pain and aid in developing clinically useful biomarkers.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFEur J Neurosci
January 2025
Department of Ear, Nose, and Throat, The First Affiliated of Soochow University, Suzhou, China.
This study aimed to investigate the topological properties of brain functional networks in patients with tinnitus of varying durations. A total of 51 tinnitus patients (divided into recent-onset tinnitus (ROT) and persistent tinnitus (PT) groups) and 27 healthy controls (HC) were recruited. All participants underwent resting-state functional MRI and audiological assessments.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFHum Brain Mapp
January 2025
Division of Brain, Imaging, and Behaviour, Krembil Brain Institute, University Health Network, Toronto, Ontario, Canada.
A fundamental issue in neuroscience is a lack of understanding regarding the relationship between brain function and the white matter architecture that supports it. Individuals with chronic neuropathic pain (NP) exhibit functional abnormalities throughout brain networks collectively termed the "dynamic pain connectome" (DPC), including the default mode network (DMN), salience network, and ascending nociceptive and descending pain modulation systems. These functional abnormalities are often observed in a sex-dependent fashion.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) is required for learning associations that determine whether animals approach or avoid potential threats in the environment. Dopaminergic (DA) projections from the ventral tegmental area (VTA) to the mPFC carry information, particularly about aversive outcomes, that may inform prefrontal computations. But the role of prefrontal DA in learning based on aversive outcomes remains poorly understood.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAnimals capable of complex behaviors tend to have more distinct brain areas than simpler organisms, and artificial networks that perform many tasks tend to self-organize into modules (1-3). This suggests that different brain areas serve distinct functions supporting complex behavior. However, a common observation is that essentially anything that an animal senses, knows, or does can be decoded from neural activity in any brain area (4-6).
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