Abstract #3145

Alteration in Medial Prefrontal Cortex in Relation with Symptom Severity in Autism Spectrum Disorder as Revealed by Resting State FMRI

Li-Ting Liu¹, Kayako Mastuo², Yung-Chin Hsu³, Shur-Fen Susan Gau¹,⁴, Ay-Woan Pan¹,⁴, Wen-Yih Isaac Tseng⁵,⁶

¹Department of Occupational Therapy, National Taiwan University, Taipei, Taiwan; ²College of Medicine, National Taiwan University, Taipei, Taiwan; ³Department of Biomedical Engineering and Environmental Sciences, National Tsing Hua University, Taiwan; ⁴Department of Psychiatry, National Taiwan University Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan; ⁵Institute of Biomedical Engineering, National Taiwan University, Taipei, Taiwan; ⁶Center for Optoelectronic Biomedicine, National Taiwan University College of Medicine, Taipei, Taiwan

We investigated the default mode network (DMN) in relation with social impairment in adolescents with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) and typically developing (TD) counterparts (N=16, each). Social responsiveness scale (SRS) was used as a clinical behavioral index. Coherent activation in the medial prefrontal cortex (MPFC) with the posterior cingulated cortex (PCC) was estimated using resting state fMRI. The DMN was clearly defined in both groups, but the MPFC co-activation with bilateral PCC was only found in TD. The negative correlation in SRS scores with the co-activation in the MPFC might possibly represent the severity of the autistic trait in adolescents.