Push-pull effects of basal ganglia network in Parkinson's disease inferred by functional MRI

Yuxin Wang; Zhiqi Jiang; Chunguang Chu; Zhen Zhang; Jiang Wang; Dianyou Li; Naying He; Chris Fietkiewicz; Changsong Zhou; Marcus Kaiser; Xuze Bai; Chencheng Zhang; Chen Liu

doi:10.1038/s41531-024-00835-7

Push-pull effects of basal ganglia network in Parkinson's disease inferred by functional MRI

NPJ Parkinsons Dis. 2024 Nov 20;10(1):224. doi: 10.1038/s41531-024-00835-7.

Authors

Yuxin Wang^#¹, Zhiqi Jiang^#¹, Chunguang Chu^#^{2

3}, Zhen Zhang¹, Jiang Wang¹, Dianyou Li⁴, Naying He⁵, Chris Fietkiewicz⁶, Changsong Zhou⁷, Marcus Kaiser^{4

8

9}, Xuze Bai¹, Chencheng Zhang^{10

11

12}, Chen Liu¹³

Affiliations

¹ School of Electrical and Information Engineering, Tianjin University, Tianjin, China.
² Institute of Science and Technology for Brain-Inspired Intelligence, Fudan University, Shanghai, China.
³ MOE Frontiers Center for Brain Science, Fudan University, Shanghai, China.
⁴ Department of Neurosurgery, Center for Functional Neurosurgery, Ruijin Hospital, Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine, Shanghai, China.
⁵ Department of Radiology, Ruijin Hospital, Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine, Shanghai, China.
⁶ Department of Mathematics & Computer Science, Hobart and William Smith Colleges, Geneva, NY, USA.
⁷ Department of Physics, Hong Kong Baptist University, Kowloon Tong, Hong Kong.
⁸ School of Computing, Newcastle University, Newcastle upon Tyne, UK.
⁹ School of Medicine, University of Nottingham, Nottingham, UK.
¹⁰ Department of Neurosurgery, Center for Functional Neurosurgery, Ruijin Hospital, Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine, Shanghai, China. i@cczhang.org.
¹¹ Clinical Neuroscience Center, Ruijin Hospital LuWan Branch, Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine, Shanghai, China. i@cczhang.org.
¹² Shanghai Research Center for Brain Science and Brain-Inspired Technology, Shanghai, China. i@cczhang.org.
¹³ School of Electrical and Information Engineering, Tianjin University, Tianjin, China. liuchen715@tju.edu.cn.

^# Contributed equally.

PMID: 39567536
DOI: 10.1038/s41531-024-00835-7

Abstract

Deep brain stimulation (DBS) can ameliorate motor symptoms in Parkinson's disease (PD), but its mechanism remains unclear. This work constructs a multi-scale brain model using the fMRI data from 27 PD patients with subthalamic DBS and 30 healthy controls. The model fits microscopic coupling parameters in the cortico-basal ganglia-thalamic neural loop to match individual connectivity, finding the "push-pull" effect of basal ganglia network. Specifically, increased GABAergic projection into the thalamus from basal ganglia worsens rigidity, while reduced GABAergic projection within the cortex exacerbates bradykinesia, suggesting that the dopamine deficiency induces the chain coupling variations to "push" the network to an abnormal state. Conversely, DBS can alleviate rigidity by enhancing GABAergic projections within the basal ganglia, and improve bradykinesia by reducing cortical projections to basal ganglia, exhibiting that DBS "pulls" the network to a healthy state. This work combines the microscopic and macroscopic neural information for understanding PD and its treatment.

Abstract

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