Department of Experimental Psychology, Helmholtz Institute, Utrecht University, Utrecht, the Netherlands.
Department of Developmental Psychology, Utrecht University, Utrecht, the Netherlands.
Brain Behav. 2019 May;9(5):e01269. doi: 10.1002/brb3.1269. Epub 2019 Mar 25.
Functional Electroencephalography (EEG) networks in infants have been proposed as useful biomarkers for developmental brain disorders. However, the reliability of these networks and their characteristics has not been established. We evaluated the reliability of these networks and their characteristics in 10-month-old infants.
Data were obtained during two EEG sessions 1 week apart and was subsequently analyzed at delta (0.5-3 Hz), theta (3-6 Hz), alpha1 (6-9 Hz), alpha2 (9-12 Hz), beta (12-25 Hz), and low gamma (25-45 Hz) frequency bands. Connectivity matrices were created by calculating the phase lag index between all channel pairs at given frequency bands. To determine the reliability of these connectivity matrices, intra-class correlations were calculated of global connectivity, local connectivity, and several graph characteristics.
Comparing both sessions, global connectivity, as well as global graph characteristics (characteristic path length and average clustering coefficient) are highly reliable across multiple frequency bands; the alpha1 and theta band having the highest reliability in general. In contrast, local connectivity characteristics were less reliable across all frequency bands.
We conclude that global connectivity measures are highly reliable over sessions. Local connectivity measures show lower reliability over sessions. This research therefore underlines the possibility of these global network characteristics to be used both as biomarkers of neurodevelopmental disorders, but also as important factors explaining development of typical behavior.
婴儿的功能性脑电图（EEG）网络被提议作为发育性脑障碍的有用生物标志物。然而，这些网络的可靠性及其特征尚未确定。我们评估了 10 个月大婴儿的这些网络的可靠性及其特征。
数据是在相隔一周的两次 EEG 会话中获得的，随后在 delta（0.5-3 Hz）、theta（3-6 Hz）、alpha1（6-9 Hz）、alpha2（9-12 Hz）、beta（12-25 Hz）和低 gamma（25-45 Hz）频段进行分析。通过在给定频段计算所有通道对之间的相位滞后指数来创建连接矩阵。为了确定这些连接矩阵的可靠性，计算了全局连接、局部连接和几个图特征的组内相关系数。
比较两次会议，全局连接以及全局图特征（特征路径长度和平均聚类系数）在多个频段上具有高度可靠性；alpha1 和 theta 频段通常具有最高的可靠性。相比之下，局部连接特征在所有频段上的可靠性都较低。
我们得出结论，全局连接测量在会议期间具有高度可靠性。局部连接测量在会议期间的可靠性较低。因此，这项研究强调了这些全局网络特征既可以作为神经发育障碍的生物标志物，也可以作为解释典型行为发展的重要因素。
