Li Ruili, Gao Yuxun, Wang Wei, Jiao Zengxin, Rao Bo, Liu Guangxue, Li Hongjun
Department of Radiology and Nuclear Medicine, Xuanwu Hospital, Capital Medical University, Beijing, China.
Department of Radiology, Beijing Youan Hospital, Capital Medical University, Beijing, China.
Front Neurol. 2022 Sep 20;13:869871. doi: 10.3389/fneur.2022.869871. eCollection 2022.
While regional brain structure and function alterations in HIV-infected individuals have been reported, knowledge about the topological organization in gray matter networks is limited. This research aims to investigate the effects of early HIV infection and combination antiretroviral therapy (cART) on gray matter structural covariance networks (SCNs) by employing graph theoretical analysis.
Sixty-five adult HIV+ individuals (25-50 years old), including 34 with cART (HIV+/cART+) and 31 medication-naïve (HIV+/cART-), and 35 demographically matched healthy controls (HCs) underwent high-resolution T-weighted images. A sliding-window method was employed to create "age bins," and SCNs (based on cortical thickness) were constructed for each bin by calculating Pearson's correlation coefficients. The group differences of network indices, including the mean nodal path length (Nlp), betweenness centrality (Bc), number of modules, modularity, global efficiency, local efficiency, and small-worldness, were evaluated by ANOVA and tests employing the network-based statistics method.
Relative to HCs, less efficiency in terms of information transfer in the parietal and occipital lobe (decreased Bc) and a compensated increase in the frontal lobe (decreased Nlp) were exhibited in both HIV+/cART+ and HIV+/cART- individuals (P < 0.05, FDR-corrected). Compared with HIV+/cART- and HCs, less specialized function segregation (decreased modularity and small-worldness property) and stronger integration in the network (increased Eglob and little changed path length) were found in HIV+/cART+ group (P < 0.05, FDR-corrected).
Early HIV+ individuals exhibited a decrease in the efficiency of information transmission in sensory regions and a compensatory increase in the frontal lobe. HIV+/cART+ showed a less specialized regional segregation function, but a stronger global integration function in the network.
虽然已有报道称HIV感染者存在局部脑结构和功能改变，但关于灰质网络拓扑组织的知识仍很有限。本研究旨在通过采用图论分析，探讨早期HIV感染和联合抗逆转录病毒疗法（cART）对灰质结构协方差网络（SCN）的影响。
65名成年HIV感染者（25 - 50岁），包括34名接受cART治疗者（HIV+/cART+）和31名未接受治疗者（HIV+/cART-），以及35名年龄、人口统计学特征匹配的健康对照者（HCs）接受了高分辨率T加权成像。采用滑动窗口法创建“年龄区间”，并通过计算皮尔逊相关系数为每个区间构建SCN（基于皮质厚度）。采用方差分析和基于网络统计方法的检验评估网络指标的组间差异，包括平均节点路径长度（Nlp）、介数中心性（Bc）、模块数、模块化程度、全局效率、局部效率和小世界特性。
相对于HCs，HIV+/cART+和HIV+/cART-个体在顶叶和枕叶的信息传递效率均较低（Bc降低），额叶则有代偿性增加（Nlp降低）（P < 0.05，经FDR校正）。与HIV+/cART-和HCs相比，HIV+/cART+组的功能分离专业性较低（模块化程度和小世界特性降低），网络整合性较强（Eglob增加，路径长度变化不大）（P < 0.05，经FDR校正）。
早期HIV感染者感觉区域的信息传递效率降低，额叶有代偿性增加。HIV+/cART+组在网络中区域分离功能专业性较低，但全局整合功能较强。
