Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2025 Sep 1;43(9):1570-1581.
doi: 10.1097/HJH.0000000000004091. Epub 2025 Jun 20.

Regional structural differences in the brain related to high blood pressure

Donggyu Rim  1 , Tye Dawood  2 , Rania Fatouleh  3 , Brendan McCarthy  4 , Gianni Sesa-Ashton  2 , Annemarie Hennessy  3   5 , Markus Schlaich  6   7 , Luke A Henderson  8 , Vaughan G Macefield  1   2   4
Affiliations

Regional structural differences in the brain related to high blood pressure

Donggyu Rim et al. J Hypertens. .

Abstract

Objective: Hypertension is characterized by elevations in sympathetic nerve activity that are consistently observed regardless of severity and treatment status. Structural changes in the brain occur with hypertension, including grey matter changes, which are associated with elevated blood pressure (BP). However, whether or not these changes are associated with increased sympathetic nerve activity in hypertensives has not been investigated. The present study aimed to determine the relationship between regional grey matter density, muscle sympathetic nerve activity (MSNA) and BP in people with hypertension, compared to normotensive participants.

Methods: T1-weighted anatomical scans (3T MRI) were acquired from 35 hypertensive and 57 normotensive participants; MSNA was successfully obtained from the right peroneal nerve in 26 hypertensives and 55 normotensives. Voxel-based morphometry (VBM) analysis was conducted to determine regional grey matter density and the relationships between MSNA and BP in both groups.

Results: An inverse relationship between MSNA and grey matter density was found in the left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, right precentral gyrus, left superior parietal lobule, and right cuneus in hypertensives but not in normotensives. In addition, hypertensive participants showed a negative correlation between grey matter density and DBP in the right precentral gyrus and left postcentral gyrus, which was not observed in controls.

Conclusion: We have shown an association between specific nuclei of the brain with elevated MSNA and BP in hypertension. These findings suggest a functional link between grey matter density in specific brain nuclei and MSNA and BP in patients with hypertension.

Keywords: MRI; blood pressure; grey matter density; hypertension; muscle sympathetic nerve activity.

PubMed Disclaimer

References

    1. Mann SJ. Neurogenic hypertension: pathophysiology, diagnosis and management. Clin Auton Res 2018; 28:363–374.
    1. Grassi G, Mark A, Esler M. The sympathetic nervous system alterations in human hypertension. Circ Res 2015; 116:976–990.
    1. Esler M. The sympathetic system and hypertension. Am J Hypertens 2000; 13:99S–105S.
    1. Grassi G, Pisano A, Bolignano D, Seravalle G, D’Arrigo G, Quarti-Trevano F, et al. Sympathetic nerve traffic activation in essential hypertension and its correlates: systematic reviews and meta-analyses. Hypertension 2018; 72:483–491.
    1. Esler M, Lambert G, Esler D, Sari CI, Guo L, Jennings G. Evaluation of elevated heart rate as a sympathetic nervous system biomarker in essential hypertension. J Hypertens 2020; 38:1488–1495.

LinkOut - more resources