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Abstract #2430

Diffusion Two-Tensor Tractography Study on Inter-Hemispheric Connection Between Bilateral Heschls Gyrus in Schizophrenia

Hsiao Piau Ng1,2, Marek Kubicki1,3, James Malcolm1, Yogesh Rathi1,3, Paula Pelavin1, Robert W. McCarley3, Martha E. Shenton1,3

1Psychiatry Neuroimaging Lab, Brigham and Women's Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, United States; 2Singapore Bioimaging Consortium, Agency for Science, Technology and Research, Singapore, -, Singapore; 3Clinical Neuroscience Division, VA Boston Healthcare System, Harvard Medical School, Brockton, MA, United States


The connection between bilateral Heschls gyrus (HG) in normal controls (NC) and schizophrenics (SZ) is investigated using DTI here. Whole-brain tractography was first generated using filtered two-tensor tractography method, instead of conventional streamline tractography. The relevant connection was then extracted using the white matter of bilateral HGs as the ROIs. Measures for quantifying the connection are mean FA, mode, trace, parallel and perpendicular diffusivity. Statistically significant between-group differences in trace, parallel and perpendicular diffusivity were observed. Our findings are consistent with theories which suggest that SZ group has decreased WM pathology, particularly in regions associated with auditory and language processing.

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