A new study published in Nature Human Behaviour on May 5, 2026, used lesion network mapping to identify brain circuits associated with specific psychiatric symptoms. Researchers analyzed data from over 1,000 patients with focal brain lesions, linking lesion locations to symptoms such as mania, depression, and obsessive-compulsive behaviors.
The team, led by Dr. Michael Fox at Harvard Medical School, found that lesions causing similar psychiatric symptoms were connected to common brain networks, even if their locations differed. For example, lesions causing mania were connected to a circuit involving the orbitofrontal cortex and the amygdala.
This approach, known as lesion network mapping, has previously been used to study neurological symptoms like hallucinations and movement disorders. The new findings suggest that psychiatric symptoms may arise from disruptions to specific neural circuits, rather than from damage to isolated brain regions.
The study's authors caution that the findings are correlational and require validation in larger, prospective studies. However, they believe this circuit-based framework could help identify new targets for brain stimulation therapies, such as transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS), for treatment-resistant psychiatric conditions.
