The Structural and Functional Connectivity of the Pineal Gland, and its Age and Gender Associations
Abstract
Purpose: The pineal gland (PG) is a structure located in the midline of the brain, and is considered the main part of the epithalamus. There are reports on the role of this area for brain function by hormone secretion, as well as few reports on its role in brain cognition. However, little knowledge is available on the structural and functional connectivity of the PG with other brain regions, as well as its age and gender associations.
Materials and Methods: In this work, we used the diffusion and resting-functional MRI data of 282 individuals, in the age range of 19 to 76 years old. All participants were checked for their medical and mental health by a general practitioner, and the MRI data were collected using a 3 Tesla scanner. The diffusion data were analyzed using the Explore DTI software (version 8.3), and the fMRI data were analyzed using the CONN toolbox (version 18.0).
Results: Two white matter tracts connecting the PG Body to PG Roots and PG to Pons were extracted in this study. The mean FA of the two tracts were 0.26 ± 0.06 and 0.24 ± 0.08, respectively. Neither the FA values of the tracts nor their lengths, showed any associations with age and gender; However, with increasing age, the likelihood of successfully identifying the PG-Pons tract decreased. In functional connectivity analysis, five brain regions showed positive connectivity with the PG, including the superior temporal gyrus, middle temporal gyrus, brain stem, vermis, and the subcallosal cortex, and 25 regions showed negative connectivity. These connectivities did not show an association with gender, but some associations with age were observed.
Conclusion: This study is novel in estimating the functional and structural connectivity of the PG with other brain areas, and also in assessing the association of these connections with age and gender, which could help to increase our knowledge on the functional neuroanatomy of the pineal gland.
1- Foroogh Razavi, Samira Raminfard, Hadis Kalantar Hormozi, Minoo Sisakhti, and Seyed Amir Hossein Batouli, "A probabilistic atlas of the pineal gland in the standard space." Frontiers in neuroinformatics, Vol. 15p. 554229, (2021).
2- Lisa A Ostrin, "Ocular and systemic melatonin and the influence of light exposure." Clinical and experimental optometry, Vol. 102 (No. 2), pp. 99-108, (2019).
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6- M Mila Macchi and Jeffrey N Bruce, "Human pineal physiology and functional significance of melatonin." Frontiers in neuroendocrinology, Vol. 25 (No. 3-4), pp. 177-95, (2004).
7- Inger Christine Munch, Morten Møller, Philip J Larsen, and Niels Vrang, "Light‐induced c‐Fos expression in suprachiasmatic nuclei neurons targeting the paraventricular nucleus of the hamster hypothalamus: phase dependence and immunochemical identification." Journal of Comparative Neurology, Vol. 442 (No. 1), pp. 48-62, (2002).
8- Tsutomu Takahashi et al., "Reduced pineal gland volume across the stages of schizophrenia." Schizophrenia Research, Vol. 206pp. 163-70, (2019).
9- Minoo Sisakhti, Lida Shafaghi, and Seyed Amir Hossein Batouli, "The Volumetric Changes of the Pineal Gland with Age: An Atlas-based Structural Analysis." Experimental Aging Research, Vol. 48 (No. 5), pp. 474-504, (2022).
10- Seyed Amir Hossein Batouli and Minoo Sisakhti, "Investigating a hypothesis on the mechanism of long-term memory storage." NeuroQuantology, Vol. 17 (No. 3), p. 60, (2019).
11- Martin Grosshans et al., "The association of pineal gland volume and body mass in obese and normal weight individuals: A pilot study." Psychiatria danubina, Vol. 28 (No. 3), pp. 220-24, (2016).
12- V Aleandri, V Spina, and A Ciardo, "The role of the pineal body in the endocrine control of puberty." Minerva Ginecologica, Vol. 49 (No. 1-2), pp. 43-48, (1997).
13- D Larry Sparks and John C Hunsaker III, "The pineal gland in sudden infant death syndrome: preliminary observations." Journal of pineal research, Vol. 5 (No. 1), pp. 111-18, (1988).
14- Jan Malte Bumb et al., "Associations of pineal volume, chronotype and symptom severity in adults with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder and healthy controls." European Neuropsychopharmacology, Vol. 26 (No. 7), pp. 1119-26, (2016).
15- Yaniv Assaf and Ofer Pasternak, "Diffusion tensor imaging (DTI)-based white matter mapping in brain research: a review." Journal of molecular neuroscience, Vol. 34pp. 51-61, (2008).
16- P Kochunov et al., "Fractional anisotropy of water diffusion in cerebral white matter across the lifespan." Neurobiology of aging, Vol. 33 (No. 1), pp. 9-20, (2012).
17- Bennett A Landman, Jonathan AD Farrell, Craig K Jones, Seth A Smith, Jerry L Prince, and Susumu Mori, "Effects of diffusion weighting schemes on the reproducibility of DTI-derived fractional anisotropy, mean diffusivity, and principal eigenvector measurements at 1.5 T." Neuroimage, Vol. 36 (No. 4), pp. 1123-38, (2007).
18- Marco Catani and Michel Thiebaut De Schotten, "A diffusion tensor imaging tractography atlas for virtual in vivo dissections." cortex, Vol. 44 (No. 8), pp. 1105-32, (2008).
19- José M Soares, Paulo Marques, Victor Alves, and Nuno Sousa, "A hitchhiker's guide to diffusion tensor imaging." Frontiers in neuroscience, Vol. 7p. 31, (2013).
20- Ben Jeurissen, Alexander Leemans, Derek K Jones, Jacques‐Donald Tournier, and Jan Sijbers, "Probabilistic fiber tracking using the residual bootstrap with constrained spherical deconvolution." Human brain mapping, Vol. 32 (No. 3), pp. 461-79, (2011).
21- Ardian Hana, Anisa Hana, Georges Dooms, Hans Boecher-Schwarz, and Frank Hertel, "Visualization of the medial forebrain bundle using diffusion tensor imaging." Frontiers in Neuroanatomy, Vol. 9p. 139, (2015).
22- Arash Kamali et al., "Revealing the ventral amygdalofugal pathway of the human limbic system using high spatial resolution diffusion tensor tractography." Brain Structure and Function, Vol. 221pp. 3561-69, (2016).
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25- Xiaoli Wu et al., "Circadian rhythm disorders and corresponding functional brain abnormalities in young female nurses: a preliminary study." Frontiers in neurology, Vol. 12p. 664610, (2021).
26- Chien-Hui Liou, Chang-Wei Hsieh, Chao-Hsien Hsieh, Jyh-Horng Chen, Chi-Hong Wang, and Si-Chen Lee, "Studies of Chinese original quiet sitting by using functional magnetic resonance imaging." in 2005 IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology 27th Annual Conference, (2006): IEEE, pp. 5317-19.
27- Tali Gorfine, Yaniv Assaf, Yonatan Goshen-Gottstein, Yaara Yeshurun, and Nava Zisapel, "Sleep-anticipating effects of melatonin in the human brain." Neuroimage, Vol. 31 (No. 1), pp. 410-18, (2006).
28- Ahmed M Radwan et al., "A comparison of diffusion MRI presurgical tractography techniques with intraoperative mapping-based validation." medRxiv, p. 2023.06. 13.23290806, (2023).
29- Andrey Zhylka, Alexander Leemans, Josien PW Pluim, and Alberto De Luca, "Anatomically informed multi-level fiber tractography for targeted virtual dissection." Magnetic Resonance Materials in Physics, Biology and Medicine, Vol. 36 (No. 1), pp. 79-93, (2023).
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31- Julie D Henry and John R Crawford, "The short‐form version of the Depression Anxiety Stress Scales (DASS‐21): Construct validity and normative data in a large non‐clinical sample." British journal of clinical psychology, Vol. 44 (No. 2), pp. 227-39, (2005).
32- Seyed Amir Hossein Batouli and Minoo Sisakhti, "Some points to consider in a task-based fMRI study: A guideline for beginners." Frontiers in Biomedical Technologies, (2020).
33- Marco Catani, Derek K Jones, Rosario Donato, and Dominic H Ffytche, "Occipito‐temporal connections in the human brain." Brain, Vol. 126 (No. 9), pp. 2093-107, (2003).
34- Marco Catani, Derek K Jones, and Dominic H Ffytche, "Perisylvian language networks of the human brain." Annals of Neurology: Official Journal of the American Neurological Association and the Child Neurology Society, Vol. 57 (No. 1), pp. 8-16, (2005).
35- Sang Seok Yeo, Jeong Pyo Seo, Yong Hyun Kwon, and Sung Ho Jang, "Precommissural fornix in the human brain: a diffusion tensor tractography study." Yonsei Medical Journal, Vol. 54 (No. 2), pp. 315-20, (2013).
36- Bram Stieltjes et al., "Diffusion tensor imaging and axonal tracking in the human brainstem." Neuroimage, Vol. 14 (No. 3), pp. 723-35, (2001).
37- Sung Ho Jang and Jeong Pyo Seo, "The anatomical location of the corticobulbar tract at the corona radiata in the human brain: diffusion tensor tractography study." Neuroscience Letters, Vol. 590pp. 80-83, (2015).
38- Shawna Farquharson et al., "White matter fiber tractography: why we need to move beyond DTI." Journal of neurosurgery, Vol. 118 (No. 6), pp. 1367-77, (2013).
39- Aurea Susana Blancas‐Velazquez, Tenna Bering, Signe Bille, and Martin Fredensborg Rath, "Role and neural regulation of clock genes in the rat pineal gland: Clock modulates amplitude of rhythmic expression of Aanat encoding the melatonin‐producing enzyme." Journal of pineal research, (2023).
40- Kristin Koller, Robert D Rafal, and Paul G Mullins, "Circadian circuits in humans: white matter microstructure predicts daytime sleepiness." cortex, Vol. 122pp. 97-107, (2020).
41- Catie Chang and Gary H Glover, "Effects of model-based physiological noise correction on default mode network anti-correlations and correlations." Neuroimage, Vol. 47 (No. 4), pp. 1448-59, (2009).
42- Chien-Hui Liou, Chang-Wei Hsieh, Chao-Hsien Hsieh, Si-Chen Lee, Jyh-Horng Chen, and Chi-Hong Wang, "Correlation between pineal activation and religious meditation observed by functional magnetic resonance imaging." Nature Precedings, pp. 1-1, (2007).
43- Zongpai Zhang et al., "Longitudinal effects of meditation on brain resting-state functional connectivity." Scientific reports, Vol. 11 (No. 1), p. 11361, (2021).
44- Xiaoli Wu, Fan Bai, Yunlei Wang, and Lu Zhang, "Circadian rhythm disorders and corresponding functional brain abnormalities in young female nurses: a preliminary study." Frontiers in neurology, Vol. 12p. 664610, (2021).
45- Antoine R Adamantidis, Carolina Gutierrez Herrera, and Thomas C Gent, "Oscillating circuitries in the sleeping brain." Nature Reviews Neuroscience, Vol. 20 (No. 12), pp. 746-62, (2019).
46- Simone Cauzzo et al., "Functional connectome of brainstem nuclei involved in autonomic, limbic, pain and sensory processing in living humans from 7 Tesla resting state fMRI." Neuroimage, Vol. 250p. 118925, (2022).
47- Elise R Facer-Childs, Brunno M Campos, Benita Middleton, Debra J Skene, and Andrew P Bagshaw, "Circadian phenotype impacts the brain’s resting-state functional connectivity, attentional performance, and sleepiness." Sleep, Vol. 42 (No. 5), p. zsz033, (2019).
48- Martin A Koch, David G Norris, and Margret Hund-Georgiadis, "An investigation of functional and anatomical connectivity using magnetic resonance imaging." Neuroimage, Vol. 16 (No. 1), pp. 241-50, (2002).
49- Michael D Greicius, Ben Krasnow, Allan L Reiss, and Vinod Menon, "Functional connectivity in the resting brain: a network analysis of the default mode hypothesis." Proceedings of the national academy of sciences, Vol. 100 (No. 1), pp. 253-58, (2003).
50- Marcus E Raichle, Ann Mary MacLeod, Abraham Z Snyder, William J Powers, Debra A Gusnard, and Gordon L Shulman, "A default mode of brain function." Proceedings of the national academy of sciences, Vol. 98 (No. 2), pp. 676-82, (2001).
51- Michael D Greicius, Kaustubh Supekar, Vinod Menon, and Robert F Dougherty, "Resting-state functional connectivity reflects structural connectivity in the default mode network." Cerebral cortex, Vol. 19 (No. 1), pp. 72-78, (2009).
2- Lisa A Ostrin, "Ocular and systemic melatonin and the influence of light exposure." Clinical and experimental optometry, Vol. 102 (No. 2), pp. 99-108, (2019).
3- Russel J Reiter, "The mammalian pineal gland: structure and function." American Journal of Anatomy, Vol. 162 (No. 4), pp. 287-313, (1981).
4- Morten Møller and Florian M Baeres, "The anatomy and innervation of the mammalian pineal gland." Cell and tissue research, Vol. 309pp. 139-50, (2002).
5- Ingo Nölte et al., "Pineal volume and circadian melatonin profile in healthy volunteers: an interdisciplinary approach." Journal of Magnetic Resonance Imaging: An Official Journal of the International Society for Magnetic Resonance in Medicine, Vol. 30 (No. 3), pp. 499-505, (2009).
6- M Mila Macchi and Jeffrey N Bruce, "Human pineal physiology and functional significance of melatonin." Frontiers in neuroendocrinology, Vol. 25 (No. 3-4), pp. 177-95, (2004).
7- Inger Christine Munch, Morten Møller, Philip J Larsen, and Niels Vrang, "Light‐induced c‐Fos expression in suprachiasmatic nuclei neurons targeting the paraventricular nucleus of the hamster hypothalamus: phase dependence and immunochemical identification." Journal of Comparative Neurology, Vol. 442 (No. 1), pp. 48-62, (2002).
8- Tsutomu Takahashi et al., "Reduced pineal gland volume across the stages of schizophrenia." Schizophrenia Research, Vol. 206pp. 163-70, (2019).
9- Minoo Sisakhti, Lida Shafaghi, and Seyed Amir Hossein Batouli, "The Volumetric Changes of the Pineal Gland with Age: An Atlas-based Structural Analysis." Experimental Aging Research, Vol. 48 (No. 5), pp. 474-504, (2022).
10- Seyed Amir Hossein Batouli and Minoo Sisakhti, "Investigating a hypothesis on the mechanism of long-term memory storage." NeuroQuantology, Vol. 17 (No. 3), p. 60, (2019).
11- Martin Grosshans et al., "The association of pineal gland volume and body mass in obese and normal weight individuals: A pilot study." Psychiatria danubina, Vol. 28 (No. 3), pp. 220-24, (2016).
12- V Aleandri, V Spina, and A Ciardo, "The role of the pineal body in the endocrine control of puberty." Minerva Ginecologica, Vol. 49 (No. 1-2), pp. 43-48, (1997).
13- D Larry Sparks and John C Hunsaker III, "The pineal gland in sudden infant death syndrome: preliminary observations." Journal of pineal research, Vol. 5 (No. 1), pp. 111-18, (1988).
14- Jan Malte Bumb et al., "Associations of pineal volume, chronotype and symptom severity in adults with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder and healthy controls." European Neuropsychopharmacology, Vol. 26 (No. 7), pp. 1119-26, (2016).
15- Yaniv Assaf and Ofer Pasternak, "Diffusion tensor imaging (DTI)-based white matter mapping in brain research: a review." Journal of molecular neuroscience, Vol. 34pp. 51-61, (2008).
16- P Kochunov et al., "Fractional anisotropy of water diffusion in cerebral white matter across the lifespan." Neurobiology of aging, Vol. 33 (No. 1), pp. 9-20, (2012).
17- Bennett A Landman, Jonathan AD Farrell, Craig K Jones, Seth A Smith, Jerry L Prince, and Susumu Mori, "Effects of diffusion weighting schemes on the reproducibility of DTI-derived fractional anisotropy, mean diffusivity, and principal eigenvector measurements at 1.5 T." Neuroimage, Vol. 36 (No. 4), pp. 1123-38, (2007).
18- Marco Catani and Michel Thiebaut De Schotten, "A diffusion tensor imaging tractography atlas for virtual in vivo dissections." cortex, Vol. 44 (No. 8), pp. 1105-32, (2008).
19- José M Soares, Paulo Marques, Victor Alves, and Nuno Sousa, "A hitchhiker's guide to diffusion tensor imaging." Frontiers in neuroscience, Vol. 7p. 31, (2013).
20- Ben Jeurissen, Alexander Leemans, Derek K Jones, Jacques‐Donald Tournier, and Jan Sijbers, "Probabilistic fiber tracking using the residual bootstrap with constrained spherical deconvolution." Human brain mapping, Vol. 32 (No. 3), pp. 461-79, (2011).
21- Ardian Hana, Anisa Hana, Georges Dooms, Hans Boecher-Schwarz, and Frank Hertel, "Visualization of the medial forebrain bundle using diffusion tensor imaging." Frontiers in Neuroanatomy, Vol. 9p. 139, (2015).
22- Arash Kamali et al., "Revealing the ventral amygdalofugal pathway of the human limbic system using high spatial resolution diffusion tensor tractography." Brain Structure and Function, Vol. 221pp. 3561-69, (2016).
23- Kat Christiansen et al., "Topographic separation of fornical fibers associated with the anterior and posterior hippocampus in the human brain: An MRI‐diffusion study." Brain and behavior, Vol. 7 (No. 1), p. e00604, (2017).
24- Gianvincenzo Sparacia, Giuseppe Parla, Giuseppe Mamone, Mariangela Caruso, Fabio Torregrossa, and Giovanni Grasso, "Resting-State Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging for Surgical Neuro-Oncology Planning: Towards a Standardization in Clinical Settings." Brain Sciences, Vol. 11 (No. 12), p. 1613, (2021).
25- Xiaoli Wu et al., "Circadian rhythm disorders and corresponding functional brain abnormalities in young female nurses: a preliminary study." Frontiers in neurology, Vol. 12p. 664610, (2021).
26- Chien-Hui Liou, Chang-Wei Hsieh, Chao-Hsien Hsieh, Jyh-Horng Chen, Chi-Hong Wang, and Si-Chen Lee, "Studies of Chinese original quiet sitting by using functional magnetic resonance imaging." in 2005 IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology 27th Annual Conference, (2006): IEEE, pp. 5317-19.
27- Tali Gorfine, Yaniv Assaf, Yonatan Goshen-Gottstein, Yaara Yeshurun, and Nava Zisapel, "Sleep-anticipating effects of melatonin in the human brain." Neuroimage, Vol. 31 (No. 1), pp. 410-18, (2006).
28- Ahmed M Radwan et al., "A comparison of diffusion MRI presurgical tractography techniques with intraoperative mapping-based validation." medRxiv, p. 2023.06. 13.23290806, (2023).
29- Andrey Zhylka, Alexander Leemans, Josien PW Pluim, and Alberto De Luca, "Anatomically informed multi-level fiber tractography for targeted virtual dissection." Magnetic Resonance Materials in Physics, Biology and Medicine, Vol. 36 (No. 1), pp. 79-93, (2023).
30- B Stieltjes, M Schlüter, HK Hahn, T Wilhelm, and M Essig, "Diffusions-Tensor-Bildgebung: Theorie, Sequenzoptimierung und Anwendungen bei Morbus Alzheimer." Der Radiologe, Vol. 43pp. 562-65, (2003).
31- Julie D Henry and John R Crawford, "The short‐form version of the Depression Anxiety Stress Scales (DASS‐21): Construct validity and normative data in a large non‐clinical sample." British journal of clinical psychology, Vol. 44 (No. 2), pp. 227-39, (2005).
32- Seyed Amir Hossein Batouli and Minoo Sisakhti, "Some points to consider in a task-based fMRI study: A guideline for beginners." Frontiers in Biomedical Technologies, (2020).
33- Marco Catani, Derek K Jones, Rosario Donato, and Dominic H Ffytche, "Occipito‐temporal connections in the human brain." Brain, Vol. 126 (No. 9), pp. 2093-107, (2003).
34- Marco Catani, Derek K Jones, and Dominic H Ffytche, "Perisylvian language networks of the human brain." Annals of Neurology: Official Journal of the American Neurological Association and the Child Neurology Society, Vol. 57 (No. 1), pp. 8-16, (2005).
35- Sang Seok Yeo, Jeong Pyo Seo, Yong Hyun Kwon, and Sung Ho Jang, "Precommissural fornix in the human brain: a diffusion tensor tractography study." Yonsei Medical Journal, Vol. 54 (No. 2), pp. 315-20, (2013).
36- Bram Stieltjes et al., "Diffusion tensor imaging and axonal tracking in the human brainstem." Neuroimage, Vol. 14 (No. 3), pp. 723-35, (2001).
37- Sung Ho Jang and Jeong Pyo Seo, "The anatomical location of the corticobulbar tract at the corona radiata in the human brain: diffusion tensor tractography study." Neuroscience Letters, Vol. 590pp. 80-83, (2015).
38- Shawna Farquharson et al., "White matter fiber tractography: why we need to move beyond DTI." Journal of neurosurgery, Vol. 118 (No. 6), pp. 1367-77, (2013).
39- Aurea Susana Blancas‐Velazquez, Tenna Bering, Signe Bille, and Martin Fredensborg Rath, "Role and neural regulation of clock genes in the rat pineal gland: Clock modulates amplitude of rhythmic expression of Aanat encoding the melatonin‐producing enzyme." Journal of pineal research, (2023).
40- Kristin Koller, Robert D Rafal, and Paul G Mullins, "Circadian circuits in humans: white matter microstructure predicts daytime sleepiness." cortex, Vol. 122pp. 97-107, (2020).
41- Catie Chang and Gary H Glover, "Effects of model-based physiological noise correction on default mode network anti-correlations and correlations." Neuroimage, Vol. 47 (No. 4), pp. 1448-59, (2009).
42- Chien-Hui Liou, Chang-Wei Hsieh, Chao-Hsien Hsieh, Si-Chen Lee, Jyh-Horng Chen, and Chi-Hong Wang, "Correlation between pineal activation and religious meditation observed by functional magnetic resonance imaging." Nature Precedings, pp. 1-1, (2007).
43- Zongpai Zhang et al., "Longitudinal effects of meditation on brain resting-state functional connectivity." Scientific reports, Vol. 11 (No. 1), p. 11361, (2021).
44- Xiaoli Wu, Fan Bai, Yunlei Wang, and Lu Zhang, "Circadian rhythm disorders and corresponding functional brain abnormalities in young female nurses: a preliminary study." Frontiers in neurology, Vol. 12p. 664610, (2021).
45- Antoine R Adamantidis, Carolina Gutierrez Herrera, and Thomas C Gent, "Oscillating circuitries in the sleeping brain." Nature Reviews Neuroscience, Vol. 20 (No. 12), pp. 746-62, (2019).
46- Simone Cauzzo et al., "Functional connectome of brainstem nuclei involved in autonomic, limbic, pain and sensory processing in living humans from 7 Tesla resting state fMRI." Neuroimage, Vol. 250p. 118925, (2022).
47- Elise R Facer-Childs, Brunno M Campos, Benita Middleton, Debra J Skene, and Andrew P Bagshaw, "Circadian phenotype impacts the brain’s resting-state functional connectivity, attentional performance, and sleepiness." Sleep, Vol. 42 (No. 5), p. zsz033, (2019).
48- Martin A Koch, David G Norris, and Margret Hund-Georgiadis, "An investigation of functional and anatomical connectivity using magnetic resonance imaging." Neuroimage, Vol. 16 (No. 1), pp. 241-50, (2002).
49- Michael D Greicius, Ben Krasnow, Allan L Reiss, and Vinod Menon, "Functional connectivity in the resting brain: a network analysis of the default mode hypothesis." Proceedings of the national academy of sciences, Vol. 100 (No. 1), pp. 253-58, (2003).
50- Marcus E Raichle, Ann Mary MacLeod, Abraham Z Snyder, William J Powers, Debra A Gusnard, and Gordon L Shulman, "A default mode of brain function." Proceedings of the national academy of sciences, Vol. 98 (No. 2), pp. 676-82, (2001).
51- Michael D Greicius, Kaustubh Supekar, Vinod Menon, and Robert F Dougherty, "Resting-state functional connectivity reflects structural connectivity in the default mode network." Cerebral cortex, Vol. 19 (No. 1), pp. 72-78, (2009).
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| Issue | Vol 13 No 1 (2026) | |
| Section | Original Article(s) | |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.18502/fbt.v13i1.20766 | |
| Keywords | ||
| Pineal Gland Diffusion Tensor Imaging function Magnetic Resonance Imaging Structural Connectivity Functional Connectivity | ||
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How to Cite
1.
Kiani P, Hassanzadeh G, Batouli SAH. The Structural and Functional Connectivity of the Pineal Gland, and its Age and Gender Associations. Frontiers Biomed Technol. 2026;13(1):77-94.
