Proposal of auxiliary diagnosis index for autism spectrum disorder using near-infrared spectroscopy

Abstract

Abstract. Lack of a diagnostic index is a problem that needs to be overcome in the diagnosis of autism spectrum disorder (ASD), because this problem prevents an objective assessment based on biomarkers. This paper describes the development of a diagnostic index for ASD using near-infrared spectroscopy (NIRS). We investigated continuous prefrontal hemodynamic changes depending on reciprocal disposition of working memory and nonworking memory tasks using two-channel NIRS. NIRS signals in the prefrontal cortex were compared between high-functioning ASD subjects (n ¼ 11) and typically developed (TD) subjects (n ¼ 21). The brain activities of the TD subjects were related to experimental design. These results were not confirmed in brain activities of ASD subjects, although the task performance rate was almost equivalent. The brain activities of TD subjects and ASD subjects were evaluated using a weighted separability (WS) index obtained from the feature phase of oxy-hemoglobin and its differential value. Calculation of the t -test (TD subject versus ASD subject) confirmed that WS was significant. This result showed that the proposed index was useful for evaluation of the brain activity of ASD subjects.

Exploring brain functions in autism spectrum disorder: A systematic review on functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) studies

“…Nine fNIRS studies have investigated working memory and inhibition in ASD. These studies observed an atypical activation in the PFC during letter-fluency tasks (Iwanami et al, 2011(Iwanami et al, , 2010Kawakubo et al, 2009), working memory tasks (Narita, 2015;Yanagisawa et al, 2016) and task switching/inhibition (Funabiki et al, 2012a(Funabiki et al, , 2012bNarita et al, 2012).…”

“…Studies of working memory conversion showed that a switching tendency of hemodynamic activation in the PFC was obvious in TDC but was not shown instantly in ASD (Narita et al, 2012;Yanagisawa et al, 2016). Regarding inhibitory control ability in ASD, studies showed reduced activation in the right PFC during a Go/No-go task (Funabiki et al, 2012;Xiao et al, 2012) compared to a TDC group and in the left ventrolateral PFC during a stop signal task compared to an ADHD group (Ishii-Takahashi et al, 2014).…”

“…These distinct patterns of neural activation during executive tasks can inform us about the engagement of cognitive control of behaviour in ASD (Corbett et al, 2010;Narita et al, 2012). For instance, Yanagisawa et al, (2016) found lower and delayed weighted separability (WS) values -indexes of quantitative evaluation that evaluate brain activity based on the feature phase of oxy-hemoglobin and its differential value -in the left dorsolateral PFC in ASD compared to TDC participants.…”

Application of functional near-infrared spectroscopy in the healthcare industry: A review

“…Color and shape span task A weighted separability index based on the HbO levels was utilized to reveal signi¯cant di®erences between the left dorsolateral PFCs of ASD patients and healthy persons during a working memory task. 45…”

Power spectrum of spontaneous cerebral homodynamic oscillation shows a distinct pattern in autism spectrum disorder

“…Several fNIRS studies on ASD have shown that children with ASD experience atypical cortical activity in cognitive tasks [16][17][18][19] as well as in resting-state [20,21]. For examples, when watching a cartoon, weak network efficiency and deficits in information exchange were observed in children with ASD [16,17].…”