The distinct disrupted plasticity in structural and functional network in mild stroke with basal ganglia region infarcts

AbstractStroke induced by basal ganglia infarction often impair cognitive function. The exploration of topological patterns in structural and functional networks associated cognitive impairment after stroke may contribute to understand the pathological mechanism of cognitive impairment caused by stroke. In this paper,  graph theory analysis was applied to diffusion-weighted imaging (DWI) data and resting-state functional MRI (fMRI) data from 23 post-stroke patients with cognitive impairment (PSCI), 17 post-stroke patients without cognitive impairment (NPSCI), and 29 healthy controls (HC). Structural and function al connectivity between 90 cortical and subcortical brain regions was estimated and set threshold to construct a set of undirected graphs. Network-based statistics (NBS) was used to characterize altered connectivity patterns among the three groups. Compared to HC, the PSCI group demonstrated substan tial reductions in all three types of connections—rich club, feeder, and local—in structural and functional networks. Specifically, in structural network analysis, reduced connections were observed within basal ganglia and basal ganglia-frontal networks, whereas in the functional network analysi s, reduced connections were observed in fronto-parietal network (FPN) and cingulo-opercular networks (CON). Meanwhile, compared to HC, the NPSCI group demonstrated reductions in both feeder and local connections only within occipital area and occipital-temporal structural netw...

Source: Brain Imaging and Behavior - June 4, 2022 Category: Neurology Source Type: research