Dataset Information

Functional Disorganization of Small-World Brain Networks in Patients With Ischemic Leukoaraiosis.

ABSTRACT: Cognitive impairment is a key clinical feature of ischemic leukoaraiosis (ILA); however, the underlying neurobiological mechanism is still unclear. ILA has been associated with widespread gray and white matter (WM) damage mainly located in cortical-cortical and cortico-subcortical pathways. A total of 36 patients with ILA (Fazekas rating score ?2) and 31 healthy controls (HCs) underwent comprehensive neuropsychological assessments (covering four cognitive domains, i.e., information processing speed, episodic memory, executive and visuospatial function) and resting-state functional MRI scans. Graph theory-based analyses were employed to explore the topological organization of the brain connectome in ILA patients, and we further sought to explore the associations of connectome-based metrics and neuropsychological performances. An efficient small-world architecture in the functional brain connectome was observed in the ILA and control groups. Moreover, compared with the HCs, the ILA patients showed increased path length and decreased network efficiency (i.e., global and local efficiency) in their functional brain networks. Further network-based statistic (NBS) analysis revealed a functional-disconnected network in ILA, which is comprised of functional connections linking different brain modules (i.e., default mode, frontoparietal, ventral attention and limbic systems) and connections within single modules (i.e., ventral attention and limbic systems). Intriguingly, the abnormal network metrics correlated with cognitive deficits in ILA patients. Therefore, our findings provide further evidence to support the concept that ILA pathologies could disrupt brain connections, impairing network functioning, and cognition via a "disconnection syndrome."

SUBMITTER: Zhu Y

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7348592 | biostudies-literature | 2020

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Functional Disorganization of Small-World Brain Networks in Patients With Ischemic Leukoaraiosis.

Zhu Yixin Y Lu Tong T Xie Chunming C Wang Qing Q Wang Yanjuan Y Cao Xuejin X Su Yuting Y Wang Zan Z Zhang Zhijun Z

Frontiers in aging neuroscience 20200703

Cognitive impairment is a key clinical feature of ischemic leukoaraiosis (ILA); however, the underlying neurobiological mechanism is still unclear. ILA has been associated with widespread gray and white matter (WM) damage mainly located in cortical-cortical and cortico-subcortical pathways. A total of 36 patients with ILA (Fazekas rating score ≥2) and 31 healthy controls (HCs) underwent comprehensive neuropsychological assessments (covering four cognitive domains, i.e., information processing sp ...[more]

PMID: 32719596

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Project description:Recently, increasing attention has been focused on the investigation of the human brain connectome that describes the patterns of structural and functional connectivity networks of the human brain. Many studies of the human connectome have demonstrated that the brain network follows a small-world topology with an intrinsically cohesive modular structure and includes several network hubs in the medial parietal regions. However, most of these studies have only focused on undirected connections between regions in which the directions of information flow are not taken into account. How the brain regions causally influence each other and how the directed network of human brain is topologically organized remain largely unknown. Here, we applied linear multivariate Granger causality analysis (GCA) and graph theoretical approaches to a resting-state functional MRI dataset with a large cohort of young healthy participants (n = 86) to explore connectivity patterns of the population-based whole-brain functional directed network. This directed brain network exhibited prominent small-world properties, which obviously improved previous results of functional MRI studies showing weak small-world properties in the directed brain networks in terms of a kernel-based GCA and individual analysis. This brain network also showed significant modular structures associated with 5 well known subsystems: fronto-parietal, visual, paralimbic/limbic, subcortical and primary systems. Importantly, we identified several driving hubs predominantly located in the components of the attentional network (e.g., the inferior frontal gyrus, supplementary motor area, insula and fusiform gyrus) and several driven hubs predominantly located in the components of the default mode network (e.g., the precuneus, posterior cingulate gyrus, medial prefrontal cortex and inferior parietal lobule). Further split-half analyses indicated that our results were highly reproducible between two independent subgroups. The current study demonstrated the directions of spontaneous information flow and causal influences in the directed brain networks, thus providing new insights into our understanding of human brain functional connectome.

Dataset Information

Functional Disorganization of Small-World Brain Networks in Patients With Ischemic Leukoaraiosis.

Publications

Functional Disorganization of Small-World Brain Networks in Patients With Ischemic Leukoaraiosis.

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