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Altered spontaneous brain activity in heavy smokers revealed by regional homogeneity

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Abstract

Rationale

Task-state and resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) studies have revealed different brain responses in chronic cigarette smokers compared with healthy controls. However, little is known about the differences between chronic cigarette smokers and healthy subjects regarding the local synchronization of spontaneous brain activity in the resting state.

Objectives

In this study, we used regional homogeneity (ReHo) analysis based on resting-state fMRI to investigate intrinsic brain activity in heavy smokers.

Methods

Thirty-one heavy smokers and 33 healthy non-smokers were included in this study. ReHo was used to measure spontaneous brain activity, and whole-brain voxel-wise comparisons of ReHo were performed to detect brain regions with altered spontaneous brain activity between groups.

Results

Compared with non-smokers, heavy smokers showed decreased ReHo primarily in brain regions associated with the default-mode, frontoparietal attention, and inhibitory control networks; heavy smokers showed increased ReHo predominately in regions related to motor planning.

Conclusions

Our results suggest that heavy smokers may have altered spontaneous brain activity in some brain regions that are associated with higher cognitive networks. Moreover, our study improves the understanding of the effects of chronic cigarette smoking on spontaneous brain activity and the pathophysiological mechanisms of nicotine dependence.

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Acknowledgments

This work was partially supported by the Natural Science Foundation of China (nos. 30700192, 81171315, 81227902 and 21221064) and National Basic Research Program of China (973 Program) grant no. 2011CB707802.

Conflict of interest

No conflict declared.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Zhongnan Hospital of Wuhan University, Wuhan, 430071, People’s Republic of China

    Guangyao Wu, Shiqi Yang & Ling Zhu

  2. National Center for Magnetic Resonance in Wuhan, State Key Laboratory of Magnetic Resonance and Atomic and Molecular Physics, Wuhan Institute of Physics and Mathematics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Wuhan, 430071, People’s Republic of China

    Fuchun Lin

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  1. Guangyao Wu
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  2. Shiqi Yang
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Correspondence to Guangyao Wu or Fuchun Lin.

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Wu, G., Yang, S., Zhu, L. et al. Altered spontaneous brain activity in heavy smokers revealed by regional homogeneity. Psychopharmacology 232, 2481–2489 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00213-015-3881-6

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