Test-retest reliability of white matter structural brain networks: a multiband diffusion MRI study

The multiband EPI sequence has been developed for the human connectome project to accelerate MRI data acquisition. However, no study has yet investigated the test-retest (TRT) reliability of the graph metrics of white matter (WM) structural brain networks constructed from this new sequence. Here, we employed a multiband diffusion MRI (dMRI) dataset with repeated scanning sessions and constructed both low- and high-resolution WM networks by volume- and surface-based parcellation methods. The reproducibility of network metrics and its dependence on type of construction procedures was assessed by the intra-class correlation coefficient (ICC). We observed conserved topological architecture of WM structural networks constructed from the multiband dMRI data as previous findings from conventional dMRI. For the global network properties, the first order metrics were more reliable than second order metrics. Between two parcellation methods, networks with volume-based parcellation showed better reliability than surface-based parcellation, especially for the global metrics. Between different resolutions, the high-resolution network exhibited higher TRT performance than the low-resolution in terms of the global metrics with a large effect size, whereas the low-resolution performs better in terms of local (region and connection) properties with a relatively low effect size. Moreover, we identified that the association and primary cortices showed higher reproducibility than the paralimbic/limbic regions. The important hub regions and rich-club connections are more reliable than the non-hub regions and connections. Finally, we found WM networks from the multiband dMRI showed higher reproducibility compared with those from the conventional dMRI. Together, our results demonstrated the fair to good reliability of the WM structural brain networks from the multiband EPI sequence, suggesting its potential utility for exploring individual differences and for clinical applications.