The problems of mouth breathing have been well-studied, but the neural correlates of functional connectivity (FC) still remain unclear. We examined the difference in FC between the two types of breathing. For our study, 21 healthy subjects performed voluntary mouth and nasal breathing conditions during a resting state functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). The region of interest (ROI) analysis of FC in fMRI was conducted using a MATLAB-based imaging software. The resulting analysis showed that mouth breathing had widespread connections and more left lateralization. Left inferior temporal gyrus had the most left lateralized connections in mouth breathing condition. Furthermore, the central opercular cortex FC showed a significant relationship with mouth breathing. For nasal breathing, the sensorimotor area had symmetry FC pattern. These findings suggest that various FCs difference appeared between two breathing conditions. The impacts of these differences need to be more investigated to find out potential link with cognitive decline in mouth breathing syndrome.

中文翻译：

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使用静息功能磁共振成像技术研究经口和鼻子自愿呼吸之间的功能连通性差异

呼吸问题已得到很好的研究，但功能连接性（FC）的神经相关性仍不清楚。我们检查了两种呼吸之间的FC差异。在我们的研究中，有21位健康受试者在静止状态功能磁共振成像（fMRI）期间进行了自愿的口鼻呼吸。使用基于MATLAB的成像软件对fMRI中FC的感兴趣区域（ROI）进行分析。结果分析表明，口呼吸具有广泛的联系，而更多的是左偏。左下颞回在口呼吸条件下具有最左侧的横向连接。此外，中央腹膜皮质FC与嘴呼吸之间存在显着关系。对于鼻呼吸，感觉运动区域具有对称的FC模式。这些发现表明两种呼吸条件之间出现了各种FC差异。需要进一步研究这些差异的影响，以发现与口呼吸综合征认知能力下降的潜在联系。