Ryan L. Muetzel1,2, Bryon A. Mueller1, Jeffrey R. Wozniak1, Christopher J. Bell1, Kelvin O. Lim1
1Department of Psychiatry, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN, USA; 2Department of Psychology, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN, USA
Recent reports suggest that schizophrenia may be a progressive illness and that age should be considered when studying white matter integrity in patients with schizophrenia. The current study used diffusion tensor imaging and an automated probabilistic tractography method to examine white matter microstructure in 34 patients with schizophrenia and 34 healthy controls. Patients showed stronger correlations between age and FA in multiple tracts compared to controls. Also, a significant age by group interaction was found in fractional anisotropy (FA) in the uncinate fasciculus. These findings show that an automated tractography method is sensitive
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