A new study that used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) and computation pattern analysis to identify differences in regional brain activity between subjects with focal epilepsy and healthy individuals highlighted three common areas of abnormality. Seizures in people with focal epilepsy can originate in various sites in the brain, but these new findings link those sites to three main brain regions, as reported in Brain Connectivity.
In the article "Abnormal Brain Areas Common to the Focal Epilepsies: Multivariate Pattern Analysis of fMRI," the authors propose that "these brain areas may represent key regional network properties underlying focal epilepsy."
Mangor Pedersen and coauthors from The Florey Institute of Neuroscience and Mental Health, The University of Melbourne, and Austin Health, Melbourne, Australia, combined three distinct but complementary fMRI measures to distinguish alterations in brain activity and the interaction between brain regions. They found abnormalities in the ipsilateral piriform cortex, temporal neocortex, and ventromedial prefrontal cortex in individuals with focal epilepsy. In addition, the researchers showed additional effects in the insula and frontal cortex and the ipsilateral thalamus/striatum.