Right limbic FDG-PET hypometabolism correlates with emotion recognition and attribution in probable behavioral variant of frontotemporal dementia patients

The behavioural variant of frontotemporal dementia (bvFTD) is a rare disease mainly affecting the social brain. FDG-PET fronto-temporal hypometabolism is a supportive feature for the diagnosis. It may also provide specific functional metabolic signatures for altered socio-emotional processing. In this study, we evaluated the emotion recognition and attribution deficits and FDG-PET cerebral metabolic patterns at the group and individual levels in a sample of sporadic bvFTD patients, exploring the cognitive-functional correlations. Seventeen probable mild bvFTD patients (10 male and 7 female; age 67.8±9.9) were administered standardized and validated version of social cognition tasks assessing the recognition of basic emotions and the attribution of emotions and intentions (i.e., Ekman 60-Faces test-Ek60F and Story-based Empathy task-SET). FDG-PET was analysed using an optimized voxel-based SPM method at the single-subject and group levels. Severe deficits of emotion recognition and processing characterized the bvFTD condition. At the group level, metabolic dysfunction in the right amygdala, temporal pole, and middle cingulate cortex was highly correlated to the emotional recognition and attribution performances. At the single-subject level, however, heterogeneous impairments of social cognition tasks emerged, and different metabolic patterns, involving limbic structures and prefrontal cortices, were also observed. The derangement of a right limbic network is associated with altered socio-emotional processing in bvFTD patients, but different hypometabolic FDG-PET patterns and heterogeneous performances on social tasks at an individual level exist

Different FDG-PET metabolic patterns at single-subject level in the behavioral variant of fronto-temporal dementia.

BACKGROUND: The diagnosis of probable behavioral variant of fronto-temporal dementia (bvFTD) according to current criteria requires the imaging evidence of frontal and/or anterior temporal atrophy or hypoperfusion/hypometabolism. Different variants of this pattern of brain involvement may, however, be found in individual cases, supporting the presence of heterogeneous phenotypes. OBJECTIVE: We examined in a case-by-case approach the FDG-PET metabolic patterns of patients fulfilling clinical criteria for probable bvFTD, assessing the presence and frequency of specific FDG-PET features. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Fifty two FDG-PET scans of probable bvFTD patients were retrospectively analyzed together with clinical and neuropsychological data. Neuroimaging experts rated the FDG-PET hypometabolism maps obtained at the single-subject level with optimized voxel-based Statistical Parametric Mapping (SPM). The functional metabolic heterogeneity was further tested by hierarchical cluster analysis and principal component analysis (PCA). RESULTS: Both the SPM maps and cluster analysis identified two major variants of cerebral hypometabolism, namely the "frontal" and the "temporo-limbic", which were correlated with different cognitive profiles. Executive and language deficits were the cognitive hallmark in the "frontal" subgroup, while poor encoding and recall on long-term memory tasks was typical of the "temporo-limbic" subgroup. DISCUSSION: SPM single-subject analysis indicates distinct patterns of brain dysfunction in bvFTD, coupled with specific clinical features, suggesting different profiles of neurodegenerative vulnerability. These findings have important implications for the early diagnosis of bvFTD and for the application of the recent international consensus criteria

Emotion Recognition Deficits in the Differential Diagnosis of Amnestic Mild Cognitive Impairment: A Cognitive Marker for the Limbic-Predominant Phenotype.

AbstractObjective:Late-onset amnestic mild cognitive impairment (aMCI) with long disease course and slow progression has been recently recognized as a possible phenotypical expression of a limbic-predominant neurodegenerative disorder. Basic emotion recognition ability crucially depending on temporo-limbic integrity is supposed to be impaired in this group of MCI subjects presenting a selective vulnerability of medio-temporal and limbic regions. However, no study specifically investigated this issue.Methods:Hereby, we enrolled 30 aMCI with a biomarker-based diagnosis of Alzheimer's disease (i.e., aMCI-AD, n = 16) or a biomarker evidence of selective medio-temporal and limbic degeneration (aMCI-mTLD, n = 14). Ekman-60 Faces Test (Ek-60F) was administered to each subject, comparing the performance with that of 20 healthy controls (HCs).Results:aMCI-mTLD subjects showed significantly lower Ek-60F global scores compared to HC (p = 0.001), whose performance was comparable to aMCI-AD. Fear (p = 0.02), surprise (p = 0.005), and anger (p = 0.01) recognition deficits characterized the aMCI-mTLD performance. Fear recognition scores were significantly lower in aMCI-mTLD compared to aMCI-AD (p = 0.04), while no differences were found in other emotions.Conclusions:Impaired social cognition, suggested by defective performance in emotion recognition tasks, may be a useful cognitive marker to detect limbic-predominant aMCI subjects among the heterogeneous aMCI population

Uso da polêmica do consumo de bebidas alcoólicas em estádios na copa do mundo de 2014 como tema gerador de debates a abordagens contextualizadas e preventivas

Esse trabalho relata resultados de uma prática pedagógica aplicada com alunos do 2º ano do Ensino Médio Regular, em uma escola da região metropolitana de João Pessoa no estado da Paraíba, proposta essa que abordou conceitos químicos dentro de uma perspectiva preventiva e informativa. Com base nos dados estatísticos que apontam um elevado índice de consumo de álcool por adolescentes, foi estruturado um plano de aula que, partindo de fatos atuais que envolvem bebidas alcoólicas, possibilitasse trabalhar aspectos químicos e sociais com estes indivíduos. Inicialmente, por meio de uma leitura seguida de debates sobre a permissão do consumo de bebidas em estádios, desencadearam-se diversas conceituações químicas, além de realizações de experimentos de cunho contextualizado. O enlace entre os aspectos do cotidiano e a experimentação corroborou para a edificação de um saber químico de caráter social, pois conseguiu-se que os educandos atuassem como atores sociais ativos do processo

Ciclo de palestras na licenciatura em química: uma abordagem contextualizada sobre a química das cores / Lecture cycle in chemistry degree: a contextualized approach to the chemistry of colors

A Química é classificada como a ciência central, pois por meio dela pode-se compreender diversos fenômenos que acontecem em nosso cotidiano, dentre eles, menciona-se as “cores”. Tal temática está associada a conceitos químicos, porém, não é tão abordada nos cursos de graduação. Diante disso, o Programa de Educação Tutorial – PET Química do Instituto Federal da Paraíba - IFPB, oferece uma atividade de ensino, denominada “Ciclo de Palestras”, que retrata temas diversificados, com a finalidade de agregar conhecimento científico e despertar um olhar crítico do discente participante. Desta forma, o objetivo desse trabalho foi apresentar uma palestra sobre a temática “A Química das Cores” para os licenciandos em Química. A pesquisa usada foi de cunho qualitativo, contendo três momentos: i) Aplicação do Questionário de Sondagem (QS); (ii) Ministração da palestra intitulada: “A Química das cores, por que enxergamos o mundo colorido?”; (iii) Aplicação do Questionário Final (QF). Nos resultados obtidos foi evidenciada a relevância e a aceitação da atividade, além do desenvolvimento dos graduandos por meio da palestra. Tais resultados respaldaram a importância de ministrar temáticas contextualizadas e interdisciplinares no ensino de Química