Honors Theses

Date of Award

Spring 5-1-2021

Document Type

Undergraduate Thesis

Department

Communication Sciences and Disorders

First Advisor

Tossi Ikuta

Relational Format

Dissertation/Thesis

Abstract

Background: This thesis was conducted in order to investigate possible connections between functional connectivity of the hippocampus in individuals who have Parkinson’s disease.

Methods: The MRI images, the clinical data, and the demographic data of 93 individuals with PD and 18 individuals without PD were obtained from the Parkinson's Progression Markers Initiative. Resting-state fMRI data from a group of PD patients was compared to a control group of non-PD patients by using previously published methods with FMRIB Software Library (FSL) as well as Analysis of Functional Neuroimages (AFNI).

Results: Compared to the control (non-PD) group, results bilaterally showed lesser connectivity between the paracingulate gyrus (PCG) and hippocampi in the PD group.

Conclusions: Results suggest a decline of dopaminergic innervation decreases synchrony of the hippocampi and paracingulate gyri (PCG). It is inferred that PD patients who also experience dementia may have a more severe loss of connectivity because of the underlying dopaminergic deficits that cause the onset of dementia.

Accessibility Status

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Creative Commons License

Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License.

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