Three Systems of Insular Functional Connectivity Identified with Cluster Analysis

By Ben Deen, Naomi B. Pitskel, Kevin A. Pelphrey. Cerebral Cortex, 2010

713 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Despite much research on the function of the insular cortex, few studies have investigated functional subdivisions of the insula in humans. The present study used resting-state functional connectivity magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to parcellate the human insular lobe based on clustering of functional connectivity patterns. Connectivity maps were computed for each voxel in the insula based on resting-state functional MRI (fMRI) data and segregated using cluster analysis. We identified 3 insular subregions with distinct patterns of connectivity: a posterior region, functionally connected with primary and secondary somatomotor cortices; a dorsal anterior to middle region, connected with dorsal anterior cingulate cortex, along with other regions of a previously described control network; and a ventral anterior region, primarily connected with pregenual anterior cingulate cortex. Applying these regions to a separate task data set, we found that dorsal and ventral anterior insula responded selectively to disgusting images, while posterior insula did not. These results demonstrate that clustering of connectivity patterns can be used to subdivide cerebral cortex into anatomically and functionally meaningful subregions; the insular regions identified here should be useful in future investigations on the function of the insula.

Subfields: Cognitive Neuroscience, Radiology, Nuclear Medicine and Imaging

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/6581b0470b1ce3ab4329c595ff0b3aaff85eba5a

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Citations in the corpus

A Convergent Functional Architecture of the Insula Emerges Across Imaging Modalities (2012, positive): “Finally, as others have pointed out (Deen et al., 2011; Laird et al., 2011) the use of pre-defined ROIs allows researchers to test hypotheses concerning differential localization or timing of stimulus or task-evoked responses without “double-dipping” (Kriegeskorte et al., 2009; Vul et al., 2009).”
An Interoceptive Predictive Coding Model of Conscious Presence (2011, methodology): “THE INSULAR CORTEX, INTEROCEPTION, AND EMOTION The human insular cortex is a large and highly interconnected structure, deeply embedded in the brain (see Figure 2; Augustine, 1996; Medford and Critchley, 2010; Deen et al., 2011).”
Resting state functional connectivity in addiction: Lessons learned and a road ahead (2012, methodology): “these insular functional subdivisions using rsFC analyses has generally bolstered such a conceptualization (Cauda et al., 2011; Deen et al., 2011; Taylor et al., 2009).”
Anterior Insular Cortex and Emotional Awareness (2013, positive): “…that the insular cortex works closely with a network of regions, including the ACC (Critchley, 2004; Critchley et al., 2004; Medford and Critchley, 2010; Fan et al., 2011; Denny et al., 2012; Lindquist et al., 2012), somatosensory cortex (Gu et al., 2013), and amygdala (Etkin and Wager, 2007).”
The Autonomic Brain: An Activation Likelihood Estimation Meta-Analysis for Central Processing of Autonomic Function (2013, background): “The insula is a functionally heterogeneous structure and has been shown previously to consist of at least three functional subregions exhibiting differential connectivity with the cingulate cortex (Deen et al., 2011).”
Decoding the role of the insula in human cognition: functional parcellation and large-scale reverse inference. (2013, background): “Our work addresses a number of limitations associated with previous functional connectivity (Cauda et al. 2011; Deen et al. 2011) and meta-analyses (Wager and Feldman-Barrett 2004; Mutschler et al.”
Common and differential neural networks of emotion regulation by Detachment, Reinterpretation, Distraction, and Expressive Suppression: A comparative fMRI investigation (2014, background): “The anterior insula has been frequently associated with emotional awareness (Craig, 2009; Deen et al., 2011; Menon and Uddin, 2010) and social emotions (Lamm and Singer, 2010; Singer et al.”
Insular intracranial activity identifies multiple facial expressions via diverse, intermixed temporal patterns at the single-contact level (2026, unknown): “Anatomical labeling of contacts that belonged to the insula was performed according to the Automated Anatomical Labeling (AAL) atlas, and parcellation of insular subregions (DAI, VAI, PI) was based on the scheme in Deen et al. 16 .”