Women’s brains experience change across menstrual cycle?

   


The unwanted visit from Aunt Flo every month not just leaves a woman with cramps, nausea, and pimples, but it has an impact on her brain as well. Yes, we aren’t kidding. According to a latest research by scientists at the Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, the structure of the hippocampus vary in parallel to the rhythm of the level of estrogen across women’s menstrual cycle.

Hippocampus plays a very important role in storing our memories and connecting them to our emotions, among other roles.

The researchers had acquired 30 longitudinal diffusion weighted imaging scans of a single healthy female subject across two full menstrual cycles. They, then, calculated hippocampal fractional anisotropy (FA), a measure sensitive to changes in micro-structural integrity, and investigated potential correlations with estrogen. The research team, it was observed a significant positive correlation between FA values and estrogen in the hippocampus bilaterally, revealing a peak in FA closely paralleling ovulation.

Claudia Barth, the lead author of the research that appeared in magazine Nature Scientific Reports, said, “We found, that in parallel to the rising estrogen levels leading up to ovulation, the Hippocampus also increases in volume--the volume of the grey matter as well as that of the white matter.”

The neuroscientist revealed, “In mice it has already been proven that it is not just this brain structure but also different behaviors which underlie a type of monthly cycle."

They further added, “Thirty longitudinal diffusion weighted imaging scans of a single healthy female subject were acquired across two full menstrual cycles. We calculated hippocampal fractional anisotropy (FA), a measure sensitive to changes in microstructural integrity, and investigated potential correlations with estrogen. We observed a significant positive correlation between FA values and estrogen in the hippocampus bilaterally, revealing a peak in FA closely paralleling ovulation.”

In this study, the major aim of the scientists is to explore the influence of endogenous estrogen on hippocampal white matter measures. By probing the influence of physiological estrogen fluctuations, researchers can reflect on the capacity of the human brain to adapt to the environment.

The researchers hope that this study could pave way to detect subtle brain changes in synchrony with the menstrual cycle. For instance: It could help in investigating the relationships of premenstrual dysphoric disorder (PMDD), which is a severe and disabling form of premenstrual syndrome affecting 3–8% of menstruating women. The disorder consists of a "cluster of affective, behavioral and somatic symptoms" that recurs during the monthly menstrual cycle.
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