Xu Shoujun, Li Meng, Yang Chunlan, Fang Xiangling, Ye Miaoting, Wu Yunfan, Yang Binrang, Huang Wenxian, Li Peng, Ma Xiaofen, Fu Shishun, Yin Yi, Tian Junzhang, Gan Yungen, Jiang Guihua
Department of Radiology, Shenzhen Children's Hospital, Shenzhen, People's Republic of China.
Department of Medical Imaging, Guangdong Second Provincial General Hospital, Guangzhou, People's Republic of China.
Neuropsychiatr Dis Treat. 2022 Jul 5;18:1363-1374. doi: 10.2147/NDT.S367104. eCollection 2022.
This study used the graph-theory approach, degree centrality (DC) to analyze whole-brain functional networks at the voxel level in children with ASD, and investigated whether DC changes were correlated with any clinical variables in ASD children.
The current study included 86 children with ASD and 54 matched healthy subjects Aged 2-5.5 years. Next, chloral hydrate induced sleeping-state functional magnetic resonance imaging (ss-fMRI) datasets were acquired from these ASD and healthy subjects. For a given voxel, the DC was calculated by calculating the number of functional connections with significantly positive correlations at the individual level. Group differences were tested using two-sample -tests ( < 0.01, AlphaSim corrected). Finally, relationships between abnormal DCs and clinical variables were investigated via Pearson's correlation analysis.
Children with ASD exhibited low DC values in the right middle frontal gyrus (MFG) ( < 0.01, AlphaSim corrected). Furthermore, significantly negative correlations were established between the decreased average DC values within the right MFG in ASD children and the total ABC scores, as well as with two ABC subscales measuring highly relevant impairments in ASD (ie, stereotypes and object-use behaviors and difficulties in language).
Taken together, the results of our ss-fMRI study suggest that abnormal DC may represent an important contribution to elucidation of the neuropathophysiological mechanisms of preschoolers with ASD.
本研究采用图论方法中的度中心性（DC）在体素水平分析自闭症谱系障碍（ASD）儿童的全脑功能网络，并探究DC变化是否与ASD儿童的任何临床变量相关。
本研究纳入了86名年龄在2至5.5岁之间的ASD儿童和54名匹配的健康受试者。接下来，从这些ASD儿童和健康受试者中获取水合氯醛诱导睡眠状态下的功能磁共振成像（ss-fMRI）数据集。对于给定的体素，通过计算个体水平上具有显著正相关的功能连接数量来计算DC。使用双样本t检验（<0.01，经AlphaSim校正）检验组间差异。最后，通过Pearson相关分析研究异常DC与临床变量之间的关系。
ASD儿童在右侧额中回（MFG）表现出较低的DC值（<0.01，经AlphaSim校正）。此外，ASD儿童右侧MFG内平均DC值的降低与ABC总分以及测量ASD中高度相关损伤的两个ABC子量表（即刻板行为和物品使用行为以及语言困难）之间建立了显著的负相关。
综上所述，我们的ss-fMRI研究结果表明，异常DC可能对阐明学龄前ASD儿童的神经病理生理机制有重要贡献。
