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Probing the Brain in Autism Using fMRI and Diffusion Tensor Imaging
Published on: September 12, 2011
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Altered inter- and intrahemispheric functional connectivity dynamics in autistic children
Xiaonan Guo1,2, Xujun Duan1,2, Heng Chen1,2,3
1The Clinical Hospital of Chengdu Brain Science Institute, MOE Key Lab for Neuroinformation, University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, Chengdu, China.
Human Brain Mapping
|October 11, 2019
Summary
Autistic children show altered brain connectivity dynamics, with abnormal temporal variability in regions supporting social processing. These changes, particularly in interhemispheric communication, correlate with social communication impairments in autism spectrum disorder (ASD).
Area of Science:
- Neuroscience
- Developmental Neuroscience
- Cognitive Neuroscience
Background:
- Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is linked to static brain connectivity issues.
- The temporal dynamics of brain connectivity in ASD remain largely unexplored.
- Understanding these dynamics is crucial for identifying neural markers of ASD.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the temporal dynamics of intra- and interhemispheric functional connectivity in children with ASD.
- To explore the relationship between altered connectivity dynamics and autism symptom severity.
- To identify specific brain regions exhibiting abnormal functional connectivity temporal variability in ASD.
Main Methods:
- Analysis of resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) data from 105 children with ASD and 102 typically developing controls (ages 7-12).
- Decomposition of whole-brain functional connectivity into ipsilateral and contralateral patterns.
- Application of sliding-window analysis to assess dynamic functional connectivity density (dFCD) and its temporal variability (standard deviation).
- Utilized support vector regression to correlate dFCD variance with autism symptom severity.
Main Results:
- Children with ASD exhibited increased dFCD variability in the anterior cingulate cortex/medial prefrontal cortex and decreased variability in the fusiform gyrus/inferior temporal gyrus compared to controls.
- Lower intrahemispheric dFCD variability was observed in sensorimotor regions (precentral/postcentral gyrus) in autistic children.
- Aberrant temporal variability in contralateral dFCD significantly predicted the severity of social communication impairments in ASD.
Conclusions:
- Autism spectrum disorder is characterized by altered temporal dynamics of both intra- and interhemispheric functional connectivity.
- These alterations are evident in brain regions integral to the social brain network.
- Abnormal interhemispheric communication dynamics may underlie impaired social processing in individuals with ASD.
