Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) Experimental Research On Human Brain Language Cognization

Purposes:To identify the cortical areas engaged during Chinese word,number and English word processing with functional magnetic resonance imaging(fMRI),To find the difference between different groups(including Chinese word and number,Chinese word and English word) and to examine the application values and reliability of fMRI for localization of functional areas in the human brain.Materials and Methods:Including two different experiments,Test1:twelve young,right-handed,native Chinese speakers participated this study,They were asked to perform four types tasks,in which they were read Chinese word,read number,look Chinese word,look number.Test2:fMRI data were collected on twelve young,right-handed,native Chinese speakers during performance of true-word,false-word and non-word in Chinese and English.MRI examination were performed on GE Signa 1.5T echospeed MR/i,fMRI raw data were dealed with SPM software, A cross correlation analysis were used to statistically generate the activation map.Results:Chinese word and number cognization test showed significant activation in BA9,BA46,While activation volume and significance decreased in number stimulation,Significant difference were found in statistic results(p<0.01).Compared with look,more brain areas participated in read task,for example frontal lobe, basal ganglia and cingulus. Chinese and English grapheme identification test showed that activation volume in left hemisphere of Chinese and English true-word were larger than that of right hemisphere,This demonstrated that the left hemisphere was the dominant hemisphere.activation were seen in BA18,BA6,BA9 when Chinese and English true-words were given ( p<0.01 ) .The activation volume and significance in frontal lobe,temporal lobe,parietal lobe of Chinese true-word were significantly smaller than that of English true-word except for occipital lobe.This demonstrated that the recognition of English words needed more attention .Conclusions:Bilateral frontal middle gyrus and frontal inferior gyrus were significantly activated in Chinese word cognization while the frontal activation areas relatively decreased in number procession,the findings suggest that the frontal lobe plays important role in procession of Chinese grapheme and meanings. We presumed that bilateral frontal lobe especially the frontal middle gyrus possibly were the control unit centre of language procession. The activation areas of Chinese true-word were consistent with that of English true-word,however,the latter were more evident.Both reflect that the dominant hemisphere of language procession is the left hemisphere. And their activation volume and significance of frontal lobe,temporal lobe,parietal lobe,occipital lobe shows high correlation.This support the theory of brain cognization network..fMRI is feasible for localizing cortical areas critical for language processing in the human brain and have a wide foreground.