Disrupted interhemispheric coordination with unaffected lateralization of global eigenvector centrality characterizes...

Area of Science:

• Neuroscience
• Neurology
• Medical Imaging

Background:

• Parkinson's disease (PD) motor symptoms typically manifest unilaterally.
• Interhemispheric relationships in early-stage, unilateral PD remain poorly understood.
• Investigating brain connectivity is crucial for understanding PD pathogenesis.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate interhemispheric functions in unilateral symptomatic Parkinson's disease (UPD) patients.
• To utilize resting-state functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (RS-fMRI) to explore brain coordination.
• To enhance understanding of the underlying mechanisms of PD.

Main Methods:

• Recruited 43 UPD patients (Hoehn-Yahr stage 1-1.5) and 54 healthy controls (NC).
• Assessed interhemispheric coordination using Voxel-Mirrored Homotopic Connectivity (VMHC).
• Analyzed hemispheric dominance with Laterality Index of Eigenvector Centrality Mapping (LI-ECM), employing correlation and ROC analyses.

Main Results:

• UPD patients exhibited significantly decreased VMHC in bilateral sensorimotor regions compared to NC.
• Decreased VMHC negatively correlated with motor impairment scores.
• VMHC demonstrated a significant ability to discriminate UPD from NC (AUC=0.759).

Conclusions:

• Disrupted interhemispheric coordination in sensorimotor regions is a key feature of early PD.
• These findings offer insights into the mechanisms of hemiparkinsonism.
• Understanding disrupted brain coordination aids in uncovering complex PD mechanisms.