It is common knowledge that alcohol consumption during pregnancy would cause cognitive impairment in children. However, recent works suggested that the risk of drinking during pregnancy may have been exaggerated. It is critical to determine whether and up to which amount the consumption of alcohol will affect the cognitive development of children. We evaluate time-varying functional connectivity using magnetoencephalogram data from somatosensory evoked response experiments for 19 teenage subjects with prenatal alcohol exposure and 21 healthy control teenage subjects using a new time-varying connectivity approach, combining renormalised partial directed coherence with state space modeling. Children exposed to alcohol prenatally are at risk of developing a Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder (FASD) characterized by cerebral connectivity deficiency and impaired cognitive abilities. Through a comparison study of teenage subjects exposed to alcohol prenatally with healthy control subjects, we establish that the inter-hemispheric connectivity is deficient for the former, which may lead to disruption in the cortical inter-hemispheric connectivity and deficits in higher order cognitive functions as measured by an IQ test, for example. We provide quantitative evidence that the disruption is correlated with cognitive deficits. These findings could lead to a novel, highly sensitive biomarker for FASD and support a recommendation of no safe amount of alcohol consumption during pregnancy.
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Quantitative assessment of cerebral connectivity deficiency and cognitive impairment in children with prenatal alcohol exposure
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April 2019
Research Article|
April 02 2019
Quantitative assessment of cerebral connectivity deficiency and cognitive impairment in children with prenatal alcohol exposure
Lin Gao;
Lin Gao
a)
1
State Key Laboratory of Manufacturing Systems Engineering, Xi’an Jiaotong University
, Xi’an 710049, Shaanxi, People’s Republic of China
2
Shaanxi Key Laboratory of Complex System Control and Intelligent Information Processing, Xi’an University of Technology
, Xi’an 710048, Shaanxi, People’s Republic of China
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Celso Grebogi;
Celso Grebogi
3
Institute for Complex Systems and Mathematical Biology, King’s College, University of Aberdeen
, Aberdeen AB24 3UE, United Kingdom
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Ying-Cheng Lai
;
Ying-Cheng Lai
4
School of Electrical, Computer and Energy Engineering, Arizona State University
, Tempe, Arizona 85287-5706, USA
5
Department of Physics, Arizona State University
, Tempe, Arizona 85287-5706, USA
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Julia Stephen;
Julia Stephen
6
The Mind Research Network
, Albuquerque, New Mexico 87131, USA
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Tongsheng Zhang;
Tongsheng Zhang
7
Department of Neurology, University of New Mexico
, Albuquerque, New Mexico 87131, USA
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Yuanli Li;
Yuanli Li
8
Department of Rehabilitation Medicine, Shanghai Bei Zhan Hospital
, Shanghai 200070, People’s Republic of China
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Haipeng Ren;
Haipeng Ren
2
Shaanxi Key Laboratory of Complex System Control and Intelligent Information Processing, Xi’an University of Technology
, Xi’an 710048, Shaanxi, People’s Republic of China
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Dichen Li;
Dichen Li
1
State Key Laboratory of Manufacturing Systems Engineering, Xi’an Jiaotong University
, Xi’an 710049, Shaanxi, People’s Republic of China
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Jue Wang;
Jue Wang
9
Institute of Biomedical Engineering, Key Laboratory of Biomedical Information Engineering of Education Ministry, Xi’an Jiaotong University
, Xi’an 710049, Shaanxi, People’s Republic of China
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Bjoern Schelter;
Bjoern Schelter
3
Institute for Complex Systems and Mathematical Biology, King’s College, University of Aberdeen
, Aberdeen AB24 3UE, United Kingdom
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Linda Sommerlade
Linda Sommerlade
3
Institute for Complex Systems and Mathematical Biology, King’s College, University of Aberdeen
, Aberdeen AB24 3UE, United Kingdom
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a)
E-mail: gaolin2013@xjtu.edu.cn
Chaos 29, 041101 (2019)
Article history
Received:
January 20 2019
Accepted:
February 20 2019
Citation
Lin Gao, Celso Grebogi, Ying-Cheng Lai, Julia Stephen, Tongsheng Zhang, Yuanli Li, Haipeng Ren, Dichen Li, Jue Wang, Bjoern Schelter, Linda Sommerlade; Quantitative assessment of cerebral connectivity deficiency and cognitive impairment in children with prenatal alcohol exposure. Chaos 1 April 2019; 29 (4): 041101. https://doi.org/10.1063/1.5089527
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