Journal
JOURNAL OF NEUROSCIENCE
Volume 28, Issue 47, Pages 12341-12348Publisher
SOC NEUROSCIENCE
DOI: 10.1523/JNEUROSCI.2324-08.2008
Keywords
depression; emotion; prefrontal cortex; ventromedial; dorsolateral; neuropathology
Categories
Funding
- National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS) [DAMD17-01-1-0675, P01 NS19632]
- National Institute on Drug Abuse [R01 DA022549]
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The neuroanatomical correlates of depression remain unclear. Functional imaging data have associated depression with abnormal patterns of activity in prefrontal cortex (PFC), including the ventromedial (vmPFC) and dorsolateral (dlPFC) sectors. If vmPFC and dlPFC are critical neural substrates for the pathogenesis of depression, then damage to either area should affect the expression of depressive symptoms. Using patients with brain lesions we show that, relative to nonfrontal lesions, bilateral vmPFC lesions are associated with markedly low levels of depression, whereas bilateral dorsal PFC lesions (involving dorsomedial and dorsolateral areas in both hemispheres) are associated with substantially higher levels of depression. These findings demonstrate that vmPFC and dorsal PFC are critically and causally involved in depression, although with very different roles: vmPFC damage confers resistance to depression, whereas dorsal PFC damage confers vulnerability.
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