The Role of the Uncinate Fasciculus in the Risk-Architecture of Bipolar Disorder: A Meta-Analysis of Diffusion Tensor Imaging Studies

Bipolar disorder (BD) is a severe mental disorder, characterized by prominent mood swings that have been hypothesized to reflect emotion regulation deficits. The uncinate fasciculus (UF) is a white matter tract that interconnects the amygdala and the ventral prefrontal cortex and has been implicated in emotion regulation. It has been proposed that aberrancies in the microstructure of the UF play a role in the etiology of BD. However, findings in individuals with BD and at familial risk for BD (AR) have yielded inconsistent findings. This meta-analysis takes a region-of-interest approach and consolidates available evidence to elucidate the role of the UF in the risk-architecture of BD.