Abstract #2112

The Brain Default Mode Network in Patients with Type 1 Diabetes and Hypoglycemia Unawareness Under Different Blood Glucose Levels

Silvia Mangia¹, Federico De Martino¹,², Anjali Kumar³, Amir Moheet³, Pete Kollasch¹, Lynn Eberly⁴, Elizabeth Seaquist³

¹CMRR - Dept. of Radiology, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN, United States; ²Department of Cognitive Neuroscience, University of Maastricht, Maastricht, Netherlands; ³Dept. of Medicine, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN, United States; ⁴Div. of Biostatistics, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN, United States

We measured the brain default mode network (DMN) in six subjects with type 1 diabetes (T1DM) and hypoglycemia unawareness and in seven healthy controls with similar age and body-mass-index, by using resting-state fMRI while blood glucose levels were controlled by hyperinsulinemic clamps. Decreased functional connectivity of some DMN regions was observed in T1DM subjects as compared to controls in euglycemia. Furthermore, whereas the prefrontal cortex had basically no functional connectivity to the other areas of the DMN during hypoglycemia in controls, such response was largely reduced in T1DM unaware patients, likely reflecting differences their perception of the stress of hypoglycemia.