A new study by UNC researchers, based on MRI brain scans of 152 infants, found disruptions in functional connectivity within part of the amygdala-prefrontal network - a pathway thought to play an important role in arousal regulation.
To our knowledge, this study is the first to show that maternal drug use during pregnancy alters the brain's functional organization in newborns," said Wei Gao, PhD, assistant professor of radiology in the University of North Carolina School of Medicine and one of the two corresponding authors of the study, published in the April 8, 2015 issue of the Journal of Neuroscience.
"This study may inform new strategies aimed at early risk identification and intervention," said Karen M. Grewen, PhD, the study's other corresponding author and associate professor of psychiatry, neurobiology and psychology.
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