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Web End = Brain Struct Funct (2016) 221:365381 DOI 10.1007/s00429-014-0912-8
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Web End = The frontal aslant tract underlies speech uency in persistent developmental stuttering
Vered Kronfeld-Duenias Ofer Amir
Ruth Ezrati-Vinacour Oren Civier
Michal Ben-Shachar
Received: 16 June 2014 / Accepted: 6 October 2014 / Published online: 26 October 2014 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2014
Abstract The frontal aslant tract (FAT) is a pathway that connects the inferior frontal gyrus with the supplementary motor area (SMA) and pre-SMA. The FAT was recently identied and introduced as part of a motor stream that plays an important role in speech production. In this study, we use diffusion imaging to examine the hypothesis that the FAT underlies speech uency, by studying its properties in individuals with persistent developmental stuttering, a speech disorder that disrupts the production of uent speech. We use tractography to quantify the volume and diffusion properties of the FAT in a group of adults who stutter (AWS) and uent controls. Additionally, we use tractography to extract these measures from the cortico-spinal tract (CST), a well-known component of the motor system. We compute diffusion measures in multiple points along the tracts, and examine the correlation between these diffusion measures and behavioral measures of speech uency. Our data show increased mean diffusivity in
bilateral FAT of AWS compared with controls. In addition, the results show regions within the left FAT and the left CST where diffusivity values are increased in AWS compared with controls. Last, we report that in AWS, diffusivity values measured within sub-regions of the left FAT negatively correlate with speech uency. Our ndings are the rst to relate the FAT with uent speech production in stuttering, thus adding to the current knowledge of the functional role that this tract plays in speech production and to the literature of the etiology of persistent developmental stuttering.
Keywords White matter Diffusion imaging Fiber
tracking Fluency Frontal aslant tract Corticospinal tract
Introduction
The frontal aslant tract (FAT) is a newly identied tract (Catani et al. 2012) that connects the inferior frontal gyrus (IFG) with...