The Study On The Effect Of Acupuncture At Lianquan (CV23) On Spontaneous Brain Function In Healthy People Based On Rs-fMRI

Objective:To observe the changes of brain spontaneous activity before and after acupuncture at Lianquan(CV23)in healthy subjects by resting state functional magnetic resonance imaging(rs-fMRI),and then analyze the effect of acupuncture on cortical swallowing central network,in order to explore the possible central mechanism of acupuncture effect of Lianquan point.Methods:Twenty healthy subjects,10 males and 10 females,aged 23 to 33 years,were enrolled in this study.All of them were right-handed.The study was approved by the Ethics Review Committee of the First Teaching Hospital of Tianjin University of Traditional Chinese Medicine.All the subjects voluntarily signed the informed consent form before the study.The study adopted self-control design.Lianquan(CV23)was selected for acupuncture intervention.Using SIMENS MAGNETOM Skyra 3.0T magnetic resonance scanner,rs-fMRI scans were performed before and after acupuncture,and brain functional magnetic resonance data were collected.Three analysis methods of whole brain low frequency amplitude(ALFF),percentage amplitude(PerAF)and mean percentage amplitude(mPerAF)were used to analyze the changes of regional spontaneous functional activity of healthy subjects before and after acupuncture.The results of unregressed whole brain average signal,0.01～0.08 Hz band and regression Power head movement parameters were supplemented to verify the stability of the data.Results:1.All the 20 healthy subjects completed the trail,including 3 cases of excessive head movement,1 case of poor standardization,data elimination,and finally included the nuclear magnetic resonance data of 16 subjects,including 7 males and 9 females,with an average age of(28.15 ±2.68)years,the years of education were(19.95 ±1.69)years,the height,weight and BMI were within the normal range,and the physical and mental conditions were normal.2.After acupuncture at Lianquan(CV23),in healthy subjects,tthe m ALFF values of bilateral middle occipital gyrus,bilateral superior occipital gyrus,right precentral gyrus,right postcentral gyrus,right superior frontal gyrus,right middle temporal gyrus and right cerebellum increased in healthy subjects.the m ALFF values of bilateral wedge anterior lobe,left middle temporal gyrus,left insular and left cerebellum decreased,and the difference was statistically significant.The brain regions with significant differences were mainly related to vision and sensorimotor in charge such as occipital lobe,precentral gyrus and postcentral gyrus,and cortical swallowing centers such as anterior and posterior central gyrus,temporal lobe and cerebellum.The brain regions with significant changes basically coincide with those found by unregressed whole brain mean,0.01～0.08 Hz band and cephalometric parameters of regression Power.(GRF correction,voxels level P < 0.05,cluster level P < 0.05,voxels > 10).3.After acupuncture at Lianquan(CV23),in healthy subjects,the PerAF values of bilateral middle occipital gyrus,bilateral superior occipital gyrus,right temporal lobe,right cerebellum,left insular lobe and left precentral gyrus increased,while those of bilateral cerebellum,left middle temporal gyrus,left superior temporal gyrus and middle left cingulate gyrus decreased,and the difference was statistically significant.The main brain regions with significant differences were the visual center of occipital lobe and the cortical swallowing center related brain areas such as precentral gyrus,temporal lobe,insular lobe and cerebellum.The brain regions with significant changes roughly coincide with those found in the unregressed whole brain mean,0.01～0.08 Hz band and cephalometric parameters of regression Power.(GRF correction,voxels level P < 0.05,cluster level P < 0.05,voxels > 10).4.After acupuncture at Lianquan(CV23),the mPerAF values of bilateral cerebellum and left superior temporal gyrus decreased in healthy subjects,and the difference was statistically significant.The brain regions with significant changes basically coincide with those found by unregressed whole brain mean,0.01～0.08 Hz band and cephalometric parameters of regression Power.(GRF correction,voxels level P < 0.05,cluster level P < 0.05,voxels > 10).Conclusion:1.In the resting state,the m ALFF,PerAF and mPerAF values of bilateral middle occipital gyrus,bilateral superior occipital gyrus,bilateral wedge anterior lobe,bilateral cerebellum,right precentral gyrus,right postcentral gyrus,right superior frontal gyrus,left middle temporal gyrus,left cingulate gyrus and left insular were significantly changed after acupuncture,mainly in visual cortex and sensorimotor cortex.It is suggested that acupuncture at Lianquan point can affect the local spontaneous brain function.2.In the resting state,the values of m ALFF,PerAF and mPerAF in the central areas of swallowing related cortex such as precentral gyrus,postcentral gyrus,temporal lobe,frontal lobe,middle cingulate gyrus,cerebellum and insular were significantly changed in healthy subjects after acupuncture,suggesting that the effect of acupuncture at Lianquan may be related to the regulation of spontaneous activity of cortical swallowing center.3.The brain regions with significant changes after acupuncture at Lianquan point are basically the same when using a variety of parameters for data processing and statistical analysis,suggesting that the results of this study are stable.