Middle Frontal Gyrus
Older news items (pre-2010) brought over from the old website
October 2009
First-time Internet users find boost in brain function after just 1 week
A study involving 24 older adults (55-78) who had minimal experience searching the internet, found that after conducting Internet searches for one hour a day for seven days (over a two-week period), they showed changes in brain activity — recruiting parts of the middle frontal gyrus and inferior frontal gyrus (areas important in working memory and decision-making). "The results suggest that searching online may be a simple form of brain exercise that might be employed to enhance cognition in older adults."
Moody, T.D., Gaddipati, H., Small, G.W. & Bookheimer, S.Y. 2009. Neural activation patterns in older adults following Internet training. Presented October 19 at the 2009 meeting of the Society for Neuroscience.
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2009-10/uoc--fiu101509.php
March 2009
Alcoholics’ brains maintain language skills at a cost
Despite the damage done by alcoholism to the frontal lobes and cerebellum, areas involved in language processing, alcoholics' language skills appear to be relatively spared from alcohol's damaging effects. A new study of 12 alcoholic males and 12 healthy controls suggests that alcoholics develop compensatory mechanisms to maintain their language skills despite alcohol's damages. The comparable performance on an auditory language task between the two groups was underlain by different neural activity (specifically, the alcoholic group showed greater activity in the left middle frontal gyrus, the right superior frontal gyrus, and the cerebellar vermis). It seems likely that this wider activity comes at the expense of other tasks, thus reducing their ability to multitask.
Chanraud-Guillermo, S. et al. 2009. Imaging of Language-Related Brain Regions in Detoxified Alcoholics. Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research, Published Online 25 March
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2009-03/ace-tbm031209.php
July 2008
Autism's social struggles due to disrupted communication networks in brain
And a timely imaging study has now provided the clearest evidence to date that synchronization in what might be termed the Theory of Mind network is impaired in autistic people. The Theory of Mind network (which includes the medial frontal gyrus, the anterior paracingulate, and the right temporoparietal junction) is responsible for processing the intentions and thoughts of others. In the study 12 high-functioning autistic adults and 12 controls viewed animated interacting geometric figures, and then asked to select the word from several choices that best described the interaction. The control subjects were consistently better at inferring the intention from the action than the participants with autism were. Brain scans revealed that synchronization between the frontal and posterior regions in the network was reliably lower in the group with autism. The autistic participants' brains also showed much lower activation levels in the frontal regions, and an independent assessment of their Theory of Mind abilities found these reliably correlated with activation in the right temporoparietal junction. The findings point to the need to develop interventions that could target this problem, and also indicate a way to measure an intervention’s effectiveness.
Kana, R.K. et al. 2008. Atypical frontal-posterior synchronization of Theory of Mind regions in autism during mental state attribution. Social Neuroscience, Published online ahead of print 3 July
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2008-07/cmu-ass072308.php
April 2008
Chinese and English dyslexias stem from different brain abnormalities.
Dyslexia involves impairment in connecting the sight and sound of a word. In English, this is commonly seen in transpositions of letters, while in Chinese, the problem can affect how a person converts a symbol into both sound and meaning. Following an earlier study in which the brain areas involved in dyslexia were found to be different for English and Chinese readers, a new technique has confirmed and clarified the results. Chinese children with dyslexia had a significantly smaller left middle frontal gyrus than did Chinese children without the disorder, even though both groups had the same overall volume of gray matter. Intriguingly, this area is not associated with symbol recognition, but with working memory. Earlier research has found English-speaking dyslexics have less gray matter in the left parietal region. The findings also suggest that dyslexics in one language will probably not be dyslexic in the other.
Siok, W.T. et al. 2008. A structural–functional basis for dyslexia in the cortex of Chinese readers. PNAS, 105 (14), 5561-5566.
http://www.nature.com/news/2008/080407/full/news.2008.739.html
http://sciencenow.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/2008/408/1?etoc
September 2007
Having right timing 'connections' in brain is key to overcoming dyslexia
New research has found that key areas for language and working memory involved in reading are connected differently in dyslexics than in children who are good readers and spellers. But, after the children with dyslexia went through a three-week instructional program, their patterns of functional brain connectivity normalized and were similar to those of good readers. The study looked specifically at activity in the left and right inferior frontal gyrus. The left inferior frontal gyrus may control the communication between the different areas involved in language, especially spoken language, while the right is thought to be involved in controlling the processing of letters in written words. Prior to the treatment these two areas were overconnected in the dyslexics, and the left inferior frontal gyrus also was overconnected to the middle frontal gyrus, which is involved in working memory that requires temporal coordination. It is not yet known how long the improvement in connectivity is maintained.
Richards, T.L. & Berninger, V.W. 2007. Abnormal fMRI connectivity in children with dyslexia during a phoneme task: Before but not after treatment. Journal of Neurolinguistics, Available online 17 August 2007.
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2007-09/uow-hrt090407.php
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/journal/09116044
February 2004
Exercise improves attention and decision-making among seniors
An imaging study involving adults ranging in age from 58 to 78 before and after a six-month program of aerobic exercise, found specific functional differences in the middle-frontal and superior parietal regions of the brain that changed with improved aerobic fitness. Consistent with the functions of these brain regions, those who participated in the aerobic-exercise intervention significantly improved their performance on a computer-based decision-making task. Those doing toning and stretching exercises did increase activation in some areas of the brain but not in those tied to better performance. Their performance on the task was not significantly different after the exercise program. The aerobic exercise used in the study involved gradually increasing periods of walking over three months. For the final three months of the intervention program, each subject walked briskly for 45 minutes in three sessions each week.
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2004-02/uoia-esf021104.php
January 2004
Training improves working memory capacity
Working memory capacity has traditionally been thought to be constant. Recent studies, however, suggest that working memory can be improved by training. In this recent imaging study, it was found that adults who practiced working memory tasks for 5 weeks showed increased brain activity in the middle frontal gyrus and superior and inferior parietal cortices. These changes could be evidence of training-induced plasticity in the neural systems that underlie working memory.
Olesen, P.J., Westerberg, H. & Klingberg, T. 2004. Increased prefrontal and parietal activity after training of working memory. Nature Neuroscience, 7(1), 75-9.
http://www.nature.com/cgi-taf/DynaPage.taf?file=/neuro/journal/v7/n1/abs/nn1165.html