Search results for "insular cortex"
showing 10 items of 25 documents
Neuroanatomical substrate of noise sensitivity.
2018
Recent functional studies suggest that noise sensitivity, a trait describing attitudes towards noise and predicting noise annoyance, is associated with altered processing in the central auditory system. In the present work, we examined whether noise sensitivity could be related to the structural anatomy of auditory and limbic brain areas. Anatomical MR brain images of 80 subjects were parcellated with FreeSurfer to measure grey matter volume, cortical thickness, cortical area and folding index of anatomical structures in the temporal lobe and insular cortex. The grey matter volume of amygdala and hippocampus was measured as well. According to our findings, noise sensitivity is associated wi…
Direction-dependent activation of the insular cortex during vertical and horizontal hand movements
2016
International audience; The planning of any motor action requires a complex multisensory processing by the brain. Gravity - immutable on Earth - has been shown to be a key input to these mechanisms. Seminal fMRI studies performed during visual perception of falling objects and self-motion demonstrated that humans represent the action of gravity in parts of the cortical vestibular system; in particular, the insular cortex and the cerebellum. However, little is known as to whether a specific neural network is engaged when processing non-visual signals relevant to gravity. We asked participants to perform vertical and horizontal hand movements without visual control, while lying in a 3T-MRI sc…
High opiate receptor binding potential in the human lateral pain system
2005
To determine how opiate receptor distribution is co-localized with the distribution of nociceptive areas in the human brain, eleven male healthy volunteers underwent one PET scan with the subtype-nonselective opioidergic radioligand [(18)F]fluoroethyl-diprenorphine under resting conditions. The binding potential (BP), a parameter for the regional cerebral opioid receptor availability, was computed using the occipital cortex as reference region. The following regions of interest (ROIs) were defined on individual MR images: thalamus, sensory motor strip (SI/MI area), frontal operculum, parietal operculum, anterior insular cortex, posterior insular cortex, anterior cingulate cortex (ACC; peri-…
Interoceptive and multimodal functions of the operculo-insular cortex: tactile, nociceptive and vestibular representations.
2013
The operculo-insular cortex has been termed the 'homeostatic control center' or 'general magnitude estimator' of the human mind. In this study, somatosensory, nociceptive and caloric vestibular stimuli were applied to reveal, whether there are mainly common, or possibly specific regions activated by one modality alone and whether lateralization effects, time pattern differences or influences of the aversive nature of the stimuli could be observed. Activation of the dorsal posterior insula was caused by all stimuli alike thus terming this area multimodal. Early phases of the noxious heat and caloric vestibular stimulation led to responses in the anterior insula. Using conjunction analyses we…
Illusion of Pain: Pre-existing Knowledge Determines Brain Activation of ‘Imagined Allodynia’
2007
Abstract Allodynia means that innocuous tactile stimulation is felt as pain. Accordingly, cerebral activations during allodynia or touch should markedly differ. The aim of this study was to investigate whether the imagination of allodynia affects brain processing of touch in healthy subjects. Seventeen healthy subjects divided into 2 subgroups were investigated: The first group (n = 7) was familiar with allodynia, based on previous pain studies, whereas the second group (n = 10) had never knowingly experienced allodynia. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging, 2 experimental conditions were investigated. In one condition the subjects were simply touched at their left hand, whereas duri…
Multiple Somatotopic Representations of Heat and Mechanical Pain in the Operculo-Insular Cortex: A High-Resolution fMRI Study
2010
Whereas studies of somatotopic representation of touch have been useful to distinguish multiple somatosensory areas within primary (SI) and secondary (SII) somatosensory cortex regions, no such analysis exists for the representation of pain across nociceptive modalities. Here we investigated somatotopy in the operculo-insular cortex with noxious heat and pinprick stimuli in 11 healthy subjects using high-resolution (2 × 2 × 4 mm) 3T functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). Heat stimuli (delivered using a laser) and pinprick stimuli (delivered using a punctate probe) were directed to the dorsum of the right hand and foot in a balanced design. Locations of the peak fMRI responses were c…
Activation of the cortical pain network by soft tactile stimulation after injection of sumatriptan.
2006
The anti-migraine drug sumatriptan often induces unpleasant somatosensory side effects, including a dislike of being touched. With a double-blind cross-over design, we studied the effects of sumatriptan and saline on perception (visual analogue scale) and cortical processing (functional magnetic resonance imaging) of tactile stimulation in healthy subjects. Soft brush stroking on the calf (n = 6) was less pleasant (p < 0.04) and evoked less activation of posterior insular cortex in the sumatriptan compared to the saline condition. Soft brushing activated pain processing regions (anterior insular, lateral orbitofrontal, and anterior cingulate cortices, and medial thalamus) only in the sumatr…
Basal opioid receptor binding is associated with differences in sensory perception in healthy human subjects: a [18F]diprenorphine PET study.
2009
The endogenous opioid system is involved in many body functions including pain processing and analgesia. To determine the role of basal opioid receptor availability in the brain in pain perception, twenty-three healthy subjects underwent positron emission tomography (PET) utilizing the subtype-nonselective opioid antagonist [(18)F]diprenorphine, quantitative sensory testing (QST) and the cold pressor test. Binding potentials (BPs) were calculated using a non-invasive reference tissue model and statistical parametric mapping was applied for t-statistical analysis on a voxelwise basis. We found that cold pain-sensitive subjects present a significantly lower BP in regions including the bilater…
The unpleasantness of tonic pain is encoded by the insular cortex
2005
Objective: Muscle pain differs from skin pain with respect to quality, accuracy of localization, and unpleasantness. This study was conducted to identify the brain regions associated with the affective-motivational component of tonic skin and muscle pain. Methods: Forty healthy volunteers were investigated in three groups with different F-18 fluorodeoxyglucose PET activation scans. A verbal rating scale (VRS) was used to quantify pain intensity and unpleasantness. One group was investigated during painful infusion of an acidified phosphate buffer (pH 5.2) into either muscle or skin for 30 minutes. Muscle and skin infusions were adjusted to achieve pain intensity rating of VRS = 40. The seco…
Evidence for modulation of opioidergic activity in central vestibular processing: A [(18)F] diprenorphine PET study.
2009
Animal and functional imaging studies had identified cortical structures such as the parieto‐insular vestibular cortex, the retro‐insular cortex, or the anterior cingulate cortex belonging to a vestibular cortical network. Basic animal studies revealed that endorphins might be important transmitters involved in cerebral vestibular processing. The aim of the present study was therefore to analyse whether the opioid system is involved in vestibular neurotransmission of humans or not. Changes in opioid receptor availability during caloric air stimulation of the right ear were studied with [(18)F] Fluoroethyl‐diprenorphine ([(18)F]FEDPN) PET scans in 10 right‐handed healthy volunteers and compa…