Department of Psychiatry, Rudolf Magnus Institute of Neuroscience, University Medical Center Utrecht, Utrecht, The Netherlands.
Brain Connect. 2013;3(1):41-9. doi: 10.1089/brain.2012.0127.
Communication and integration of information between brain regions plays a key role in healthy brain function. Conversely, disruption in brain communication may lead to cognitive and behavioral problems. Autism is a neurodevelopmental disorder that is characterized by impaired social interactions and aberrant basic information processing. Aberrant brain connectivity patterns have indeed been hypothesized to be a key neural underpinning of autism. In this study, graph analytical tools are used to explore the possible deviant functional brain network organization in autism at a very early stage of brain development. Electroencephalography (EEG) recordings in 12 toddlers with autism (mean age 3.5 years) and 19 control subjects were used to assess interregional functional brain connectivity, with functional brain networks constructed at the level of temporal synchronization between brain regions underlying the EEG electrodes. Children with autism showed a significantly increased normalized path length and reduced normalized clustering, suggesting a reduced global communication capacity already during early brain development. In addition, whole brain connectivity was found to be significantly reduced in these young patients suggesting an overall under-connectivity of functional brain networks in autism. Our findings support the hypothesis of abnormal neural communication in autism, with deviating effects already present at the early stages of brain development.
脑区之间的信息交流和整合在大脑健康功能中起着关键作用。相反，大脑通讯的中断可能导致认知和行为问题。自闭症是一种神经发育障碍，其特征是社交互动受损和基本信息处理异常。异常的大脑连接模式确实被假设为自闭症的一个关键神经基础。在这项研究中，使用图分析工具来探索自闭症在大脑发育的早期阶段可能存在的异常功能大脑网络组织。使用脑电图 (EEG) 记录了 12 名自闭症儿童（平均年龄 3.5 岁）和 19 名对照者，以评估脑电电极下脑区之间的区域间功能大脑连接，使用功能大脑网络构建在大脑区域之间的时间同步水平上。自闭症儿童的归一化路径长度显著增加，归一化聚类减少，表明在早期大脑发育过程中，整体通讯能力已经降低。此外，这些年轻患者的全脑连接明显减少，表明自闭症的功能大脑网络整体连接不足。我们的发现支持自闭症中异常神经通讯的假设，在大脑发育的早期阶段就已经存在偏差效应。
