Schedule of Events | Symposia

Structural codependence between deep brain nuclei and sensorimotor cortical regions differs between people with depression and unaffected individuals

Poster Session D - Monday, March 31, 2025, 8:00 – 10:00 am EDT, Back Bay Ballroom/Republic Ballroom

Siraj Lyons¹, Isak Beck², Brendan Depue¹; ¹University of Louisville, ²Arizona State University

Depression impacts nearly 3% of the global adult population. Symptomatology is likely related to regions encompassing frontoparietal, somatosensory, and salience networks. Questions regarding deep brain nuclei (DBN), including the subthalamic nucleus (STN), substantia nigra (SN), and red nucleus (RN) remain unanswered. Using an existing structural neuroimaging dataset including 86 individuals (37 diagnosed with depression; Baranger et al., 2021), frequentist and Bayesian logistic regressions assessed whether DBN volumes predict diagnosis. Furthermore, we completed structural covariance analyses in FreeSurfer tested diagnostic differences in deep brain volume and cortical morphometry covariance. Correlations tested if relationships between implicated cortical regions and depression symptomatology. We obseved that simple DBN volumes did not predict diagnostic group. However, group differences emerged in deep brain/cortical covariance. Right RN volume covaried with right frontal operculum and left parietal operculum thicknesses, while left RN and right STN volumes covaried with right occipital pole volume. Positive relationships were observed within the unaffected group and negative relationships among those with depression. These effects did not correlate with depression symptomatology. Structural codependence between DBN and cortical regions may be important in depression, potentially for sensorimotor features. Future work should focus on causal mechanisms of DBN involvement with sensory integration.

Topic Area: EMOTION & SOCIAL: Other