Gordon Center for Medical Imaging, Department of Radiology, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, MA, USA; Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA; Athinoula A. Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging, Department of Radiology, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, MA, USA; Computational Neuroimaging Lab, Biobizkaia Health Research Institute, Barakaldo, Spain; IKERBASQUE Basque Foundation for Science, Bilbao, Spain.
Gordon Center for Medical Imaging, Department of Radiology, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, MA, USA; Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA; Athinoula A. Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging, Department of Radiology, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, MA, USA.
Neuroimage Clin. 2024;44:103688. doi: 10.1016/j.nicl.2024.103688. Epub 2024 Oct 15.
Growing evidence suggests that cerebral connectivity changes its network organization by altering modular topology in response to developmental and environmental experience. However, changes in cerebral connectivity associated with visual impairment due to early neurological injury are still not fully understood. Cerebral visual impairment (CVI) is a brain-based visual disorder associated with damage and maldevelopment of retrochiasmal pathways and areas implicated in visual processing. In this study, we used a multimodal imaging approach and connectomic analyses based on structural (voxel-based morphometry; VBM) and resting state functional connectivity (rsfc) to investigate differences in weighted degree and link-level connectivity in individuals with CVI compared to controls with neurotypical development. We found that participants with CVI showed significantly reduced grey matter volume within the primary visual cortex and intraparietal sulcus (IPS) compared to controls. Participants with CVI also exhibited marked reorganization characterized by increased integration of visual connectivity to somatosensory and multimodal integration areas (dorsal and ventral attention regions) and lower connectivity from visual to limbic and default mode networks. Link-level functional changes in CVI were also associated with key clinical outcomes related to visual function and development. These findings provide early insight into how visual impairment related to early brain injury distinctly reorganizes the functional network architecture of the human brain.
越来越多的证据表明，大脑连接通过改变模块拓扑结构来响应发育和环境经验，从而改变其网络组织。然而，由于早期神经损伤导致的视觉障碍相关的大脑连接变化仍未被完全理解。脑性视觉障碍（CVI）是一种与视通路和涉及视觉处理的区域的损伤和发育不良相关的基于大脑的视觉障碍。在这项研究中，我们使用了多模态成像方法和基于结构（体素形态测量学；VBM）和静息状态功能连接（rsfc）的连接组学分析，来研究 CVI 个体与具有神经典型发育的对照组之间加权度数和链路水平连接的差异。我们发现，与对照组相比，CVI 参与者的初级视觉皮层和顶内沟（IPS）内的灰质体积明显减少。CVI 参与者还表现出明显的重组特征，表现为视觉连接到躯体感觉和多模态整合区域（背侧和腹侧注意区域）的整合增加，而视觉到边缘和默认模式网络的连接减少。CVI 中的链路水平功能变化也与与视觉功能和发育相关的关键临床结果相关。这些发现为了解与早期脑损伤相关的视觉障碍如何明显地重新组织人类大脑的功能网络架构提供了早期的见解。
