Collision sports athletes experience many head acceleration events (HAEs) per season. The effects of these subconcussive events are largely understudied since HAEs may produce no overt symptoms, and ...are likely to diffusely manifest across multiple scales of study (e.g., molecular, cellular network, and behavior). This study integrated resting-state fMRI with metabolome, transcriptome and computational virtual reality (VR) behavior measures to assess the effects of exposure to HAEs on players in a collegiate American football team. Permutation-based mediation and moderation analysis was used to investigate relationships between network fingerprint, changes in omic measures and VR metrics over the season. Change in an energy cycle fatty acid, tridecenedioate, moderated the relationship between 1) miR-505 and DMN fingerprint and 2) the relationship between DMN fingerprint and worsening VR Balance measures (all p less than or equal to 0.05). In addition, the similarity in DMN over the season was negatively related to cumulative number of HAEs above 80G, and DMN fingerprint was less similar across the season in athletes relative to age-matched non-athletes. miR-505 was also positively related to average number of HAEs above 25G per session. It is important to note that tridecenedioate has a double bond making it a candidate for ROS scavenging. These findings between a candidate ROS-related metabolite, inflammatory miRNA, altered brain imaging and diminished behavioral performance suggests that impact athletes may experience chronic neuroinflammation. The rigorous permutation-based mediation/moderation may provide a methodology for investigating complex multi-scale biological data within humans alone and thus assist study of other functional brain problems.
Recent research has shown there can be detrimental neurological effects of short- and long-term exposure to contact sports. In the present study, metabolomic profiling was combined with inflammatory ...miRNA quantification, computational behavior with virtual reality (VR) testing of motor control, and head collision event monitoring to explore trans-omic and collision effects on human behavior across a season of players on a collegiate American football team. We integrated permutation-based statistics with mediation analyses to test complex, directional relationships between miRNAs, metabolites, and VR task performance. Fourteen significant mediations (metabolite = mediator; miRNA = independent variable; VR score = dependent variable) were discovered at preseason (N=6) and across season (N=8) with Sobel p-values less than or equal to 0.05 and with total effects at or exceeding 50%. The majority of mediation findings involved long to medium chain fatty acids (2-HG, 8-HOA, UND, sebacate, suberate, and heptanoate). In parallel, TCA metabolites were found to be significantly decreased at postseason relative to preseason. HAEs were associated with metabolomic measures and miRNA levels across-season. Together, these observations suggest a state of chronic HAE-induced neuroinflammation (as evidence by elevated miRNAs) and mitochondrial dysfunction (as observed by abnormal FAs and TCA metabolites) that together produce subtle changes in neurological function (as observed by impaired motor control behavior). These findings point to a shift in mitochondrial metabolism, away from mitochondria function, consistent with other illnesses classified as mitochondrial disorders, suggesting a plausible mechanism underlying HAEs in contact sports and potential avenue for treatment intervention.
