Melissa Lopez-Larson1,2, Jadwiga Rogowska3,
Deborah Yurgelun-Todd1,2
1Brain Institute, University of Utah,
Salt Lake City, UT, United States; 2VISN 19 MIRECC, Salt Lake
City, UT, United States; 3Brain Imaging Center, McLean
Hospital/Harvard Medical School, Belmont, MA, United States
This
is one of the first studies to evaluate cortico-cerebellar circuits in a
group of adolescents with heavy marijuana (MJ) use utilizing a bilateral
finger tapping fMRI task. Nineteen MJ using adolescents and 19 aged-matched
healthy controls (HC) had functional (f)MRI scans on a 3T Siemens Trio
scanner, including a standard bilateral fMRI finger tapping sequence. HC were
found to have greater activation than MJ for Broadmanns areas 4 and 6 and in
the cerebellum. Furthermore, our findings suggest that age of first use and
amount of MJ used may have an impact on functioning in the developing brain.
Keywords