Multiple Voxel Pattern Analysis Shows Associations Between Chronic Fatigue Syndrome and Cortical Atrophy, 2025, Wu et al

[Wyva]

Now published - see here
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Kang Wu, Yihuai Zou, Yuanyuan Li, Xiaojie Hu, Yahui Wang, TZ CHEN, Yuhang Chen, Kuangshi Li

Abstract

Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS) is a disease characterized by unexplained fatigue and impaired cognition for more than six months. Recent studies have reported declines in large-scale brain networks' functional connections among patients with CFS, and these declines correlated with the patients' symptom severity. However, these reported networks are inconsistent.

Brain structure serves as the essential architecture supporting brain functional fluctuations. Investigating structural alterations could provide insights into functional changes in different brain areas and facilitate the clinical diagnosis of CFS.

In this study, we recruited 37 patients with CFS and 34 healthy controls to collect their clinical assessments and structural magnetic resonance imaging data. Multiple Voxel Pattern Analysis (MVPA) was employed to recognize chronic fatigue-related brain areas, and cortical thickness was compared between the two groups.

By constructing a predictive MVPA classifier with 70% balanced accuracy, we identified five relevant brain areas, including the paracentral cortex, precentral cortex, central cortex, intraparietal cortex, and superior temporal cortex.

Subsequently, the results showed that the thickness of these areas had associations with fatigue severity, healthy life status, and pain levels among our subjects. Furthermore, compared to healthy controls, the thickness reduction was observed in patients with CFS.

In summary, our study revealed a pathological chronic fatigue pattern for understanding CFS and suggested associations between cortical atrophy and CFS, with the aim of highlighting potential impacts of chronic fatigue. The trial was registered in the Chinese Clinical Trial Registry (ChiCTR2000032577).

Only abstract available: https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/neuroscience/articles/10.3389/fnins.2025.1535088/abstract

 

[Wyva]

I'm not sure if this is true ME/CFS research or not. May be just chronic fatigue.

 

[Hutan]

Yes, it seems that any sort of neuronal loss can cause cortical thinning - dementia, Parkinsons, aging, brain injury. If the authors think that CFS is a disease only of fatigue and impaired cognition, then the study doesn't tell us much.

I don't think we have seen much consistency between studies about the parts of the brain that are found to have different volumes in ME/CFS. ?

 

[Utsikt]

I googled the registration number, and it’s identical to this study:
https://www.s4me.info/threads/tai-c...ith-machine-learning-and-fmri-analysis.30717/

Might just be a mistake. But if it’s a part of the same protocol, they used Fukuda in the 2022 study.

 

[forestglip]

Now published:

Link | PDF

 

[Utsikt]

The patients with CFS were diagnosed according to 1994 Fukuda CDC criteria (Fukuda et al., 1994) which defines a patient as someone experiencing chronic fatigue lasting over 6 months and this fatigue feeling is not primarily derived from clinical diseases. The HC were age-matched people without chronic fatigue. All subjects were right-handed and aged between 25 and 65, and none had histories of mental disorders or use of psychotropic drugs. Pregnant women, lactating women, women who were menstruating during MRI scanning, and subjects with abnormal brain structure or a body mass index (BMI) > 45, were excluded.

I wonder what being right-handed has to do with anything - why would they report this?
And is it normal to exclude women that menstruate during the MRI scanning?

 

[forestglip]

I wonder what being right-handed has to do with anything - why would they report this?

I assume since right and left handed people's brains are expected to look a bit different, since different parts of the brain control the two sides of the body, so might have changed structurally after a lifetime of use.

Here's one study from a quick search. No idea how well replicated the science is, but it makes sense to match to play it safe.

Asymmetries of cortical thickness: effects of handedness, sex, and schizophrenia (2007, Neuroreport)

Hand preference (dextrality) significantly influenced regional asymmetries in parietal association and dorsomedial frontal cortices (false discovery rate-corrected), where medial-frontal regions showed diagnosis by dextrality effects (uncorrected). Thus, dextrality relates to cortical thickness asymmetries [...]

 

[ME/CFS Skeptic]

Here's the data on the cortical thickness of the brain areas they tested in both groups:

The average cortical thicknesses of the areas showed a significant difference between the CFS group and HC group (MeanCFS group = 2.37 mm, MeanHC group = 2.43 mm, p = 0.011, Figure 6). And this difference was still obvious after eliminating confounding factors of age, gender, and BMI (p = 0.034).