ORIGINAL RESEARCH

Neuroimaging approach to identification of working memory biomarkers in patients with chronic cerebral ischemia

About authors

Research Center of Neurology, Moscow, Russia

Correspondence should be addressed: Vitaly F. Fokin
Volokolamskoye shosse 80, Moscow, 125367, Russia; ur.liam@fvf

About paper

Funding: the study was supported by the RSF grant (No. 22-15-00448).

Author contribution: Fokin VF — manuscript writing; Ponomareva NV — design of physiological and neuropsychological tests, general study design; Konovalov RN — neuroimaging test design; Medvedev RB — Doppler tests; Boravova AI — psychophysiological tests; Lagoda OV — clinical tests; Krotenkova MV — neuroimaging test management; Tanashyan MM — clinical test management, general study design.

Compliance with ethical standards: the study was approved by the Ethics Committee of the Research Center of Neurology (protocol No. 5-6/22 dated 1 June 2022). The informed consent was submitted by all study participants.

Received: 2024-08-29 Accepted: 2024-09-16 Published online: 2024-09-30
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Verbal working memory (VWM) is a fundamental function responsible for temporary storage and short-term handling of verbal information. The study was aimed to determine the working memory biomarker associated with imaging of the source of infra-slow electrical activity in patients with chronic cerebral ischemia (CCI). A total of 50 patients with CCI took part in the study: 16 males and 34 females aged 50–85 years. VWM was evaluated by the Luria test. The subjects were divided into two groups matched by age with the VWM below and above the average level for the studied sample. The infra-slow, below 0.1 Hz, electrical activity, otherwise known as the DC potentials (DCPs) of the brain, was recorded with five monopolar leads: frontal, central, occipital, right and left temporal. The resting state fMRI was used to analyze brain regions with the activated BOLD (blood-oxygen-level-dependent) signal that were associated with the brain regions responsible for VWM and the DCP generation sources recorded with the non-polarizable electrodes. The differences in BOLD signal activation and infra-slow activity amplitude were found in two VWM groups. These resting-state neural networks, VWM and the neural network responsible for DCP generation, overlapped in frontal regions. There were significant differences in DCP recorded with the frontal lead in two VWM groups (р = 0.00004). In patients with CCI, infra-slow activity, recorded with the frontal lead that is generated by the neural network fragment representing an intersection of the VWM network and the part of the brain responsible for DCP generation in the frontal region, is a VWM biomarker.

Keywords: chronic cerebral ischemia, verbal working memory, resting fMRI, infra-slow electrical activity, DC potential, overlapping resting neural networks

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