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Updated: Feb 4, 2026
Network Analysis of the Default Mode Network Using Functional Connectivity MRI in Temporal Lobe Epilepsy
Published on: August 5, 2014
Network characteristics in benign epilepsy with centro-temporal spikes patients indicating defective connectivity
Giulia Varotto1, Silvana Franceschetti1, Davide Caputo1
1Department of Neurophysiopathology, Fondazione IRCCS Istituto Neurologico Carlo Besta, Via Celoria 11, 20133 Milano, Italy.
Objective:
To investigate the changes in EEG connectivity in children with the typical presentation of benign epilepsy with centro-temporal spikes (BECTS).
Methods:
We compared awake and spindle-sleep EEG recordings obtained by a standard electrode array in patients with lateralised (10 Right, 9 Left-BECTS) or bilateral spikes (10 MF-BECTS) and in 17 age-matched controls. We analysed EEG activity using partial directed coherence, an estimator of connectivity based on the multivariate autoregressive models and calculated in- and out-degrees, strength, clustering coefficient and betweenness centrality.
Results:
In comparison with the controls, the awake EEG recordings of the patients with lateralised BECTS showed a minimal increase in out-degrees on F4 and F3. The greater differences, found during sleep, included significant reductions in both in- and out-degrees and strength in all of the patient groups, but in T4 or T3 showing increased out-degrees and strength in Right and Left-BECTS. Betweenness centrality was significantly reduced on C3 and C4 in the patients with MF-BECTS.
Conclusions:
Our observations suggest that the main finding in BECTS patients is widely reduced local connectivity.
Significance:
The network changes in BECTS can be interpreted as a permissive condition occurring in a developmental window that predisposes to seizure generation during spindle-sleep.
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