Dynamic brain network reconfiguration as a potential schizophrenia genetic risk mechanism modulated by NMDA receptor function

Behavioural and functional evidence revealing the role of RBFOX1 variation in multiple psychiatric disorders and traits

Common variation in the gene encoding the neuron-specific RNA splicing factor RNA Binding Fox-1 Homolog 1 (RBFOX1) has been identified as a risk factor for several psychiatric conditions, and rare genetic variants have been found causal for autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Here, we explored the genetic landscape of RBFOX1 more deeply, integrating evidence from existing and new human studies as well as studies in Rbfox1 knockout mice. Mining existing data from large-scale studies of human common genetic variants, we confirmed gene-based and genome-wide association of RBFOX1 with risk tolerance, major depressive disorder and schizophrenia. Data on six mental disorders revealed copy number losses and gains to be more frequent in ASD cases than in controls. Consistently, RBFOX1 expression appeared decreased in post-mortem frontal and temporal cortices of individuals with ASD and prefrontal cortex of individuals with schizophrenia. Brain-functional MRI studies demonstrated that carriers of a common RBFOX1 variant, rs6500744, displayed increased neural reactivity to emotional stimuli, reduced prefrontal processing during cognitive control, and enhanced fear expression after fear conditioning, going along with increased avoidance behaviour. Investigating Rbfox1 neuron-specific knockout mice allowed us to further specify the role of this gene in behaviour. The model was characterised by pronounced hyperactivity, stereotyped behaviour, impairments in fear acquisition and extinction, reduced social interest, and lack of aggression; it provides excellent construct and face validity as an animal model of ASD. In conclusion, convergent translational evidence shows that common variants in RBFOX1 are associated with a broad spectrum of psychiatric traits and disorders, while rare genetic variation seems to expose to early-onset neurodevelopmental psychiatric disorders with and without developmental delay like ASD, in particular. Studying the pleiotropic nature of RBFOX1 can profoundly enhance our understanding of mental disorder vulnerability.

Aberrant maturation and connectivity of prefrontal cortex in schizophrenia-contribution of NMDA receptor development and hypofunction

The neurobiology of schizophrenia involves multiple facets of pathophysiology, ranging from its genetic basis over changes in neurochemistry and neurophysiology, to the systemic level of neural circuits. Although the precise mechanisms associated with the neuropathophysiology remain elusive, one essential aspect is the aberrant maturation and connectivity of the prefrontal cortex that leads to complex symptoms in various stages of the disease. Here, we focus on how early developmental dysfunction, especially N-methyl-D-aspartate receptor (NMDAR) development and hypofunction, may lead to the dysfunction of both local circuitry within the prefrontal cortex and its long-range connectivity. More specifically, we will focus on an "all roads lead to Rome" hypothesis, i.e., how NMDAR hypofunction during development acts as a convergence point and leads to local gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA) deficits and input-output dysconnectivity in the prefrontal cortex, which eventually induce cognitive and social deficits. Many outstanding questions and hypothetical mechanisms are listed for future investigations of this intriguing hypothesis that may lead to a better understanding of the aberrant maturation and connectivity associated with the prefrontal cortex.

Relationship Between Replay-Associated Ripples and Hippocampal N-Methyl-D-Aspartate Receptors: Preliminary Evidence From a PET-MEG Study in Schizophrenia

Background and Hypotheses

Hippocampal replay and associated high-frequency ripple oscillations are among the best-characterized phenomena in resting brain activity. Replay/ripples support memory consolidation and relational inference, and are regulated by N-methyl-D-aspartate receptors (NMDARs). Schizophrenia has been associated with both replay/ripple abnormalities and NMDAR hypofunction in both clinical samples and genetic mouse models, although the relationship between these 2 facets of hippocampal function has not been tested in humans.

Study Design

Here, we avail of a unique multimodal human neuroimaging data set to investigate the relationship between the availability of (intrachannel) NMDAR binding sites in hippocampus, and replay-associated ripple power, in 16 participants (7 nonclinical participants and 9 people with a diagnosis of schizophrenia, PScz). Each participant had both a [18F]GE-179 positron emission tomography (PET) scan (to measure NMDAR availability, V T ) and a magnetoencephalography (MEG) scan (to measure offline neural replay and associated high-frequency ripple oscillations, using Temporally Delayed Linear Modeling).

Study Results

We show a positive relationship between hippocampal NMDAR availability and replay-associated ripple power. This linkage was evident across control participants (r(5) = .94, P = .002) and PScz (r(7) = .70, P = .04), with no group difference.

Conclusions

Our findings provide preliminary evidence for a relationship between hippocampal NMDAR availability and replay-associated ripple power in humans, and haverelevance for NMDAR hypofunction theories of schizophrenia.

Modularity maximization as a flexible and generic framework for brain network exploratory analysis

The modular structure of brain networks supports specialized information processing, complex dynamics, and cost-efficient spatial embedding. Inter-individual variation in modular structure has been linked to differences in performance, disease, and development. There exist many data-driven methods for detecting and comparing modular structure, the most popular of which is modularity maximization. Although modularity maximization is a general framework that can be modified and reparamaterized to address domain-specific research questions, its application to neuroscientific datasets has, thus far, been narrow. Here, we highlight several strategies in which the "out-of-the-box" version of modularity maximization can be extended to address questions specific to neuroscience. First, we present approaches for detecting "space-independent" modules and for applying modularity maximization to signed matrices. Next, we show that the modularity maximization frame is well-suited for detecting task- and condition-specific modules. Finally, we highlight the role of multi-layer models in detecting and tracking modules across time, tasks, subjects, and modalities. In summary, modularity maximization is a flexible and general framework that can be adapted to detect modular structure resulting from a wide range of hypotheses. This article highlights multiple frontiers for future research and applications.

Psilocybin therapy increases cognitive and neural flexibility in patients with major depressive disorder

Psilocybin has shown promise for the treatment of mood disorders, which are often accompanied by cognitive dysfunction including cognitive rigidity. Recent studies have proposed neuropsychoplastogenic effects as mechanisms underlying the enduring therapeutic effects of psilocybin. In an open-label study of 24 patients with major depressive disorder, we tested the enduring effects of psilocybin therapy on cognitive flexibility (perseverative errors on a set-shifting task), neural flexibility (dynamics of functional connectivity or dFC via functional magnetic resonance imaging), and neurometabolite concentrations (via magnetic resonance spectroscopy) in brain regions supporting cognitive flexibility and implicated in acute psilocybin effects (e.g., the anterior cingulate cortex, or ACC). Psilocybin therapy increased cognitive flexibility for at least 4 weeks post-treatment, though these improvements were not correlated with the previously reported antidepressant effects. One week after psilocybin therapy, glutamate and N-acetylaspartate concentrations were decreased in the ACC, and dFC was increased between the ACC and the posterior cingulate cortex (PCC). Surprisingly, greater increases in dFC between the ACC and PCC were associated with less improvement in cognitive flexibility after psilocybin therapy. Connectome-based predictive modeling demonstrated that baseline dFC emanating from the ACC predicted improvements in cognitive flexibility. In these models, greater baseline dFC was associated with better baseline cognitive flexibility but less improvement in cognitive flexibility. These findings suggest a nuanced relationship between cognitive and neural flexibility. Whereas some enduring increases in neural dynamics may allow for shifting out of a maladaptively rigid state, larger persisting increases in neural dynamics may be of less benefit to psilocybin therapy.

Graph Theoretic Analysis of Multilayer EEG Connectivity Networks

Over the past twenty years, functional connectivity of the human brain has been studied in detail using tools from complex network theory. These methods include graph theoretic metrics ranging from the micro-scale such as the degree of a node to the macro-scale such as the small worldness of the brain network. However, most of these network models focus on average activity within a time window of interest and given frequency band. Therefore, they cannot capture the changes in network connectivity across time and different frequency bands. Recently, multilayer brain networks have attracted a lot of attention as they can capture the full view of neuronal connectivity. In this paper, we introduce a multilayer view of the functional connectivity network of the brain, where each layer corresponds to a different frequency band. We construct multi-frequency connectivity networks from electroencephalogram data where the intra-layer edges are quantified by phase synchrony while the inter-layer edges are quantified by phase-amplitude coupling. We then introduce multilayer degree, participation coefficient and clustering coefficient to quantify the centrality of nodes across frequency layers and to identify the importance of different frequency bands. The proposed framework is applied to electroencephalogram data collected during a study of error monitoring in the human brain.

Multiple-brain systems dynamically interact during tonic and phasic states to support language integrity in temporal lobe epilepsy

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Unique brain dynamics occur during language task in left temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE).

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Multiple brain systems interact to implement compensated language status in TLE.

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Tonic/rest dynamics exert influence and may prime the level of phasic/task dynamics.

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Multi-network integrations are compensatory in patients with lower language skills.

An epileptogenic focus in the dominant temporal lobe can result in the reorganization of language systems in order to compensate for compromised functions. We studied the compensatory reorganization of language in the setting of left temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE), taking into account the interaction of language (L) with key non-language (NL) networks such as dorsal attention (DAN), fronto-parietal (FPN) and cingulo-opercular (COpN), with these systems providing cognitive resources helpful for successful language performance.

We applied tools from dynamic network neuroscience to functional MRI data collected from 23 TLE patients and 23 matched healthy controls during the resting state (RS) and a sentence completion (SC) task to capture how the functional architecture of a language network dynamically changes and interacts with NL systems in these two contexts.

We provided evidence that the brain areas in which core language functions reside dynamically interact with non-language functional networks to carry out linguistic functions. We demonstrated that abnormal integrations between the language and DAN existed in TLE, and were present both in tonic as well as phasic states. This integration was considered to reflect the entrainment of visual attention systems to the systems dedicated to lexical semantic processing. Our data made clear that the level of baseline integrations between the language subsystems and certain NL systems (e.g., DAN, FPN) had a crucial influence on the general level of task integrations between L/NL systems, with this a normative finding not unique to epilepsy. We also revealed that a broad set of task L/NL integrations in TLE are predictive of language competency, indicating that these integrations are compensatory for patients with lower overall language skills.

We concluded that RS establishes the broad set of L/NL integrations available and primed for use during task, but that the actual use of those interactions in the setting of TLE depended on the level of language skill. We believe our analyses are the first to capture the potential compensatory role played by dynamic network reconfigurations between multiple brain systems during performance of a complex language task, in addition to testing for characteristics in both the phasic/task and tonic/resting state that are necessary to achieve language competency in the setting of temporal lobe pathology. Our analyses highlighted the intra- versus inter-system communications that form the basis of unique language processing in TLE, pointing to the dynamic reconfigurations that provided the broad multi-system support needed to maintain language skill and competency.

Acute Effect of Betel Quid Chewing on Brain Network Dynamics: A Resting-State Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging Study

Betel quid (BQ) is one of the most popular addictive substances in the world. However, the neurophysiological mechanism underlying BQ addiction remains unclear. This study aimed to investigate whether and how BQ chewing would affect brain function in the framework of a dynamic brain network model. Resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging scans were collected from 24 male BQ-dependent individuals and 26 male non-addictive healthy individuals before and promptly after chewing BQ. Switching rate, a measure of temporal stability of functional brain networks, was calculated at both global and local levels for each scan. The results showed that BQ-dependent and healthy groups did not significantly differ on switching rate before BQ chewing (F = 0.784, p = 0.381, analysis of covariance controlling for age, education, and head motion). After chewing BQ, both BQ-dependent (t = 2.674, p = 0.014, paired t-test) and healthy (t = 2.313, p = 0.029, paired t-test) individuals showed a significantly increased global switching rate compared to those before chewing BQ. Significant corresponding local-level effects were observed within the occipital areas for both groups, and within the cingulo-opercular, fronto-parietal, and cerebellum regions for BQ-dependent individuals. Moreover, in BQ-dependent individuals, switching rate was significantly correlated with the severity of BQ addiction assessed by the Betel Quid Dependence Scale scores (Spearman's rho = 0.471, p = 0.020) before BQ chewing. Our study provides preliminary evidence for the acute effects of BQ chewing on brain functional dynamism. These findings may provide insights into the neural mechanisms of substance addictions.

The Imbalanced Plasticity Hypothesis of Schizophrenia-Related Psychosis: A Predictive Perspective

A considerable number of studies have attempted to account for the psychotic aspects of schizophrenia in terms of the influential predictive coding (PC) hypothesis. We argue that the prediction-oriented perspective on schizophrenia-related psychosis may benefit from a mechanistic model that: 1) gives due weight to the extent to which alterations in short- and long-term synaptic plasticity determine the degree and the direction of the functional disruption that occurs in psychosis; and 2) addresses the distinction between the two central syndromes of psychosis in schizophrenia: disorganization and reality-distortion. To accomplish these goals, we propose the Imbalanced Plasticity Hypothesis - IPH, and demonstrate that it: 1) accounts for commonalities and differences between disorganization and reality distortion in terms of excessive (hyper) or insufficient (hypo) neuroplasticity, respectively; 2) provides distinct predictions in the cognitive and electrophysiological domains; and 3) is able to reconcile conflicting PC-oriented accounts of psychosis.

Childhood trauma is linked to decreased temporal stability of functional brain networks in young adults

BACKGROUND

Both childhood trauma and disruptions in brain functional networks are implicated in the development of psychiatric disorders in early adulthood. However, the relationships between these two factors remain unclear. This study aimed to investigate whether and how childhood trauma would relate to changes of functional network dynamics in young adults.

METHODS

Resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging data were collected from 53 young healthy adults, whose childhood trauma histories were assessed by the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire (CTQ). Network switching rate, a measure of stability of dynamic brain networks over time, was calculated at both global and local levels for each participant. Switching rates at both levels were compared between participants with and without childhood trauma, and further correlated with CTQ total score.

RESULTS

In the current sample, 19 (35.8%) participants reported a history of childhood trauma. At the global level, participants with childhood trauma showed significantly higher network switching rates than those without trauma (F = 10.021, p = 0.003). A significant positive correlation was found between network switching rates and CTQ scores in the entire sample (r = 0.378, p = 0.007). At the local level, these effects were mainly observed in the default-mode, fronto-parietal, cingulo-opercular, and occipital subnetworks.

CONCLUSIONS

Our study provides preliminary evidence for a possible long-term effect of childhood trauma on brain functional dynamism. These findings may have potential contributions to psychiatric disorders during adulthood.

The impact of graph construction scheme and community detection algorithm on the repeatability of community and hub identification in structural brain networks

A critical question in network neuroscience is how nodes cluster together to form communities, to form the mesoscale organisation of the brain. Various algorithms have been proposed for identifying such communities, each identifying different communities within the same network. Here, (using test–retest data from the Human Connectome Project), the repeatability of thirty‐three community detection algorithms, each paired with seven different graph construction schemes were assessed. Repeatability of community partition depended heavily on both the community detection algorithm and graph construction scheme. Hard community detection algorithms (in which each node is assigned to only one community) outperformed soft ones (in which each node can belong to more than one community). The highest repeatability was observed for the fast multi‐scale community detection algorithm paired with a graph construction scheme that combines nine white matter metrics. This pair also gave the highest similarity between representative group community affiliation and individual community affiliation. Connector hubs had higher repeatability than provincial hubs. Our results provide a workflow for repeatable identification of structural brain networks communities, based on the optimal pairing of community detection algorithm and graph construction scheme.

Temporal stability of the ventral attention network and general cognition along the Alzheimer's disease spectrum

Understanding the interrelationships of clinical manifestations of Alzheimer's disease (AD) and functional connectivity (FC) as the disease progresses is necessary for use of FC as a potential neuroimaging biomarker. Degradation of resting-state networks in AD has been observed when FC is estimated over the entire scan, however, the temporal dynamics of these networks are less studied. We implemented a novel approach to investigate the modular structure of static (sFC) and time-varying (tvFC) connectivity along the AD spectrum in a two-sample Discovery/Validation design (n = 80 and 81, respectively). Cortical FC networks were estimated across 4 diagnostic groups (cognitively normal, subjective cognitive decline, mild cognitive impairment, and AD) for whole scan (sFC) and with sliding window correlation (tvFC). Modularity quality (across a range of spatial scales) did not differ in either sFC or tvFC. For tvFC, group differences in temporal stability within and between multiple resting state networks were observed; however, these differences were not consistent between samples. Correlation analyses identified a relationship between global cognition and temporal stability of the ventral attention network, which was reproduced in both samples. While the ventral attention system has been predominantly studied in task-evoked designs, the relationship between its intrinsic dynamics at-rest and general cognition along the AD spectrum highlights its relevance regarding clinical manifestation of the disease.

Brain network dynamics during working memory are modulated by dopamine and diminished in schizophrenia

Dynamical brain state transitions are critical for flexible working memory but the network mechanisms are incompletely understood. Here, we show that working memory performance entails brain-wide switching between activity states using a combination of functional magnetic resonance imaging in healthy controls and individuals with schizophrenia, pharmacological fMRI, genetic analyses and network control theory. The stability of states relates to dopamine D1 receptor gene expression while state transitions are influenced by D2 receptor expression and pharmacological modulation. Individuals with schizophrenia show altered network control properties, including a more diverse energy landscape and decreased stability of working memory representations. Our results demonstrate the relevance of dopamine signaling for the steering of whole-brain network dynamics during working memory and link these processes to schizophrenia pathophysiology.

Working memory requires the brain to switch between cognitive states and activity patterns. Here, the authors show that the steering of these neural network dynamics is influenced by dopamine D1- and D2-receptor function and altered in schizophrenia.

Early changes in brain network topology and activation of affective pathways predict persistent pain in the rat

Adaptations in brain communication are associated with multiple pain disorders and are hypothesized to promote the transition from acute to chronic pain. Despite known increases in brain synaptic activity, it is unknown if and how changes in pathways and networks contribute to persistent pain. A tunable rat model that induces transient or persistent temporomandibular joint pain was used to characterize brain network and subcircuit changes when sensitivity is detected in both transient and persistent pain groups and later when sensitivity is present only for the persistent pain group. Brain activity was measured by F-FDG positron emission tomography imaging and used to construct intersubject correlation networks; network connectivity distributions, diagnostics, and community structure were assessed. Activation of subcircuits was tested by structural equation modeling. Findings reveal differences in the brain networks at day 7 between the persistent and transient pain groups, a time when peripheral sensitivity is detected in both groups, but spontaneous pain occurs only in the persistent pain group. At day 7, increased (P ≤ 0.01) clustering, node strength, network segregation, and activation of prefrontal-limbic pathways are observed only in the group that develops persistent pain. Later, increased clustering and node strength are more pronounced with persistent pain, particularly within the limbic system, and decrease when pain resolves. Pretreatment with intra-articular etanercept to attenuate pain confirms that these adaptations are associated with pain onset. Results suggest that early and sustained brain changes can differentiate persistent and transient pain, implying they could be useful as prognostic biomarkers for persistent pain and in identifying therapeutic targets.

Structural control energy of resting-state functional brain states reveals less cost-effective brain dynamics in psychosis vulnerability

How the brain's white-matter anatomy constrains brain activity is an open question that might give insights into the mechanisms that underlie mental disorders such as schizophrenia. Chromosome 22q11.2 deletion syndrome (22q11DS) is a neurodevelopmental disorder with an extremely high risk for psychosis providing a test case to study developmental aspects of schizophrenia. In this study, we used principles from network control theory to probe the implications of aberrant structural connectivity for the brain's functional dynamics in 22q11DS. We retrieved brain states from resting-state functional magnetic resonance images of 78 patients with 22q11DS and 85 healthy controls. Then, we compared them in terms of persistence control energy; that is, the control energy that would be required to persist in each of these states based on individual structural connectivity and a dynamic model. Persistence control energy was altered in a broad pattern of brain states including both energetically more demanding and less demanding brain states in 22q11DS. Further, we found a negative relationship between persistence control energy and resting-state activation time, which suggests that the brain reduces energy by spending less time in energetically demanding brain states. In patients with 22q11DS, this behavior was less pronounced, suggesting a deficiency in the ability to reduce energy through brain activation. In summary, our results provide initial insights into the functional implications of altered structural connectivity in 22q11DS, which might improve our understanding of the mechanisms underlying the disease.

Understanding neural flexibility from a multifaceted definition

Flexibility is a hallmark of human intelligence. Emerging studies have proposed several flexibility measurements at the level of individual regions, to produce a brain map of neural flexibility. However, flexibility is usually inferred from separate components of brain activity (i.e., intrinsic/task-evoked), and different definitions are used. Moreover, recent studies have argued that neural processing may be more than a task-driven and intrinsic dichotomy. Therefore, the understanding to neural flexibility is still incomplete. To address this issue, we propose a multifaceted definition of neural flexibility according to three key features: broad cognitive engagement, distributed connectivity, and adaptive connectome dynamics. For these three features, we first review the advances in computational approaches, their functional relevance, and their potential pitfalls. We then suggest a set of metrics that can help us assign a flexibility rating to each region. Subsequently, we present an emergent probabilistic view for further understanding the functional operation of individual regions in the unified framework of intrinsic and task-driven states. Finally, we highlight several areas related to the multifaceted definition of neural flexibility for future research. This review not only strengthens our understanding of flexible human brain, but also suggests that the measure of neural flexibility could bridge the gap between understanding intrinsic and task-driven brain function dynamics.

Altered Cerebro-Cerebellar Dynamic Functional Connectivity in Alcohol Use Disorder: a Resting-State fMRI Study

Alcohol use disorder (AUD) is widely associated with cerebellar dysfunction and altered cerebro-cerebellar functional connectivity (FC) that lead to cognitive impairments. Evidence for this association comes from resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging (rsfMRI) studies that assess time-averaged measures of FC across the duration of a typical scan. This approach, however, precludes the assessment of potentially FC dynamics happening at faster timescales. In this study, using rsfMRI data, we aim at exploring cerebro-cerebellar FC dynamics in AUD patients (N = 18) and age- and sex-matched controls (N = 18). In particular, we quantified group-level differences in the temporal variability of FC between the posterior cerebellum and large-scale cognitive systems, and we investigated the role of the cerebellum in large-scale brain dynamics in terms of the temporal flexibility and integration of its regions. We found that, relative to controls, the AUD group exhibited significantly greater FC variability between the cerebellum and both the frontoparietal executive control (F_1,31 = 7.01, p(FDR) = 0.028) and ventral attention (F_1,31 = 7.35, p(FDR) = 0.028) networks. Moreover, the AUD group exhibited significantly less flexibility (F_1,31 = 8.61, p(FDR) = 0.028) and greater integration (F_1,31 = 9.11, p(FDR) = 0.028) in the cerebellum. Finally, in an exploratory analysis, we found distributed changes in the dynamics of canonical large-scale networks in AUD. Overall, this study brings evidence of AUD-related alterations in dynamic FC within major cerebro-cerebellar networks. This pattern has implications for explaining the development and maintenance of this disorder and improving our understating of the cerebellum's involvement in addiction.

Do NMDA-R antagonists re-create patterns of spontaneous gamma-band activity in schizophrenia? A systematic review and perspective

NMDA-R hypofunctioninig is a core pathophysiological mechanism in schizophrenia. However, it is unclear whether the physiological changes observed following NMDA-R antagonist administration are consistent with gamma-band alterations in schizophrenia. This systematic review examined the effects of NMDA-R antagonists on the amplitude of spontaneous gamma-band activity and functional connectivity obtained from preclinical (n = 24) and human (n = 9) studies and compared these data to resting-state EEG/MEG-measurements in schizophrenia patients (n = 27). Overall, the majority of preclinical and human studies observed increased gamma-band power following acute administration of NMDA-R antagonists. However, the direction of gamma-band power alterations in schizophrenia were inconsistent, which involved upregulation (n = 10), decreases (n = 7), and no changes (n = 8) in spectral power. Five out of 6 preclinical studies observed increased connectivity, while in healthy controls receiving Ketamine and in schizophrenia patients the direction of connectivity results was also inconsistent. Accordingly, the effects of NMDA-R hypofunctioning on gamma-band oscillations are different than pathophysiological signatures observed in schizophrenia. The implications of these findings for current E/I balance models of schizophrenia are discussed.

Dynamic community detection reveals transient reorganization of functional brain networks across a female menstrual cycle

Sex steroid hormones have been shown to alter regional brain activity, but the extent to which they modulate connectivity within and between large-scale functional brain networks over time has yet to be characterized. Here, we applied dynamic community detection techniques to data from a highly sampled female with 30 consecutive days of brain imaging and venipuncture measurements to characterize changes in resting-state community structure across the menstrual cycle. Four stable functional communities were identified, consisting of nodes from visual, default mode, frontal control, and somatomotor networks. Limbic, subcortical, and attention networks exhibited higher than expected levels of nodal flexibility, a hallmark of between-network integration and transient functional reorganization. The most striking reorganization occurred in a default mode subnetwork localized to regions of the prefrontal cortex, coincident with peaks in serum levels of estradiol, luteinizing hormone, and follicle stimulating hormone. Nodes from these regions exhibited strong intranetwork increases in functional connectivity, leading to a split in the stable default mode core community and the transient formation of a new functional community. Probing the spatiotemporal basis of human brain–hormone interactions with dynamic community detection suggests that hormonal changes during the menstrual cycle result in temporary, localized patterns of brain network reorganization.

Sex steroid hormones influence the central nervous system across multiple spatiotemporal scales. Estrogen and progesterone concentrations rise and fall throughout the menstrual cycle, but it remains poorly understood whether day-to-day fluctuations in hormones shape human brain dynamics. Here, we assessed the structure and stability of resting-state brain network connectivity in concordance with serum hormone levels from a female who underwent fMRI and venipuncture for 30 consecutive days. Our results reveal that while network structure is largely stable over the course of a menstrual cycle, temporary reorganization of several large-scale functional brain networks occurs during the ovulatory window. In particular, a default mode subnetwork exhibits increased connectivity with itself and with nodes belonging to the temporoparietal and limbic networks, providing novel perspective into brain-hormone interactions.

Unraveling reproducible dynamic states of individual brain functional parcellation

Data-driven parcellations are widely used for exploring the functional organization of the brain, and also for reducing the high dimensionality of fMRI data. Despite the flurry of methods proposed in the literature, functional brain parcellations are not highly reproducible at the level of individual subjects, even with very long acquisitions. Some brain areas are also more difficult to parcellate than others, with association heteromodal cortices being the most challenging. An important limitation of classical parcellations is that they are static, that is, they neglect dynamic reconfigurations of brain networks. In this paper, we proposed a new method to identify dynamic states of parcellations, which we hypothesized would improve reproducibility over static parcellation approaches. For a series of seed voxels in the brain, we applied a cluster analysis to regroup short (3 min) time windows into "states" with highly similar seed parcels. We split individual time series of the Midnight scan club sample into two independent sets of 2.5 hr (test and retest). We found that average within-state parcellations, called stability maps, were highly reproducible (over 0.9 test-retest spatial correlation in many instances) and subject specific (fingerprinting accuracy over 70% on average) between test and retest. Consistent with our hypothesis, seeds in heteromodal cortices (posterior and anterior cingulate) showed a richer repertoire of states than unimodal (visual) cortex. Taken together, our results indicate that static functional parcellations are incorrectly averaging well-defined and distinct dynamic states of brain parcellations. This work calls to revisit previous methods based on static parcellations, which includes the majority of published network analyses of fMRI data. Our method may, thus, impact how researchers model the rich interactions between brain networks in health and disease.

Integrated metastate functional connectivity networks predict change in symptom severity in clinical high risk for psychosis

The ability to identify biomarkers of psychosis risk is essential in defining effective preventive measures to potentially circumvent the transition to psychosis. Using samples of people at clinical high risk for psychosis (CHR) and Healthy controls (HC) who were administered a task fMRI paradigm, we used a framework for labelling time windows of fMRI scans as 'integrated' FC networks to provide a granular representation of functional connectivity (FC). Periods of integration were defined using the 'cartographic profile' of time windows and k-means clustering, and sub-network discovery was carried out using Network Based Statistics (NBS). There were no network differences between CHR and HC groups. Within the CHR group, using integrated FC networks, we identified a sub-network negatively associated with longitudinal changes in the severity of psychotic symptoms. This sub-network comprised brain areas implicated in bottom-up sensory processing and in integration with motor control, suggesting it may be related to the demands of the fMRI task. These data suggest that extracting integrated FC networks may be useful in the investigation of biomarkers of psychosis risk.

Measurement reliability for individual differences in multilayer network dynamics: Cautions and considerations

Multilayer network models have been proposed as an effective means of capturing the dynamic configuration of distributed neural circuits and quantitatively describing how communities vary over time. Beyond general insights into brain function, a growing number of studies have begun to employ these methods for the study of individual differences. However, test-retest reliabilities for multilayer network measures have yet to be fully quantified or optimized, potentially limiting their utility for individual difference studies. Here, we systematically evaluated the impact of multilayer community detection algorithms, selection of network parameters, scan duration, and task condition on test-retest reliabilities of multilayer network measures (i.e., flexibility, integration, and recruitment). A key finding was that the default method used for community detection by the popular generalized Louvain algorithm can generate erroneous results. Although available, an updated algorithm addressing this issue is yet to be broadly adopted in the neuroimaging literature. Beyond the algorithm, the present work identified parameter selection as a key determinant of test-retest reliability; however, optimization of these parameters and expected reliabilities appeared to be dataset-specific. Once parameters were optimized, consistent with findings from the static functional connectivity literature, scan duration was a much stronger determinant of reliability than scan condition. When the parameters were optimized and scan duration was sufficient, both passive (i.e., resting state, Inscapes, and movie) and active (i.e., flanker) tasks were reliable, although reliability in the movie watching condition was significantly higher than in the other three tasks. The minimal data requirement for achieving reliable measures for the movie watching condition was 20 min, and 30 min for the other three tasks. Our results caution the field against the use of default parameters without optimization based on the specific datasets to be employed - a process likely to be limited for most due to the lack of test-retest samples to enable parameter optimization.

Static and dynamic functional connectivity supports the configuration of brain networks associated with creative cognition

Creative cognition is recognized to involve the integration of multiple spontaneous cognitive processes and is manifested as complex networks within and between the distributed brain regions. We propose that the processing of creative cognition involves the static and dynamic re-configuration of brain networks associated with complex cognitive processes. We applied the sliding-window approach followed by a community detection algorithm and novel measures of network flexibility on the blood-oxygen level dependent (BOLD) signal of 8 major functional brain networks to reveal static and dynamic alterations in the network reconfiguration during creative cognition using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). Our results demonstrate the temporal connectivity of the dynamic large-scale creative networks between default mode network (DMN), salience network, and cerebellar network during creative cognition, and advance our understanding of the network neuroscience of creative cognition.

Towards precise resting-state fMRI biomarkers in psychiatry: synthesizing developments in transdiagnostic research, dimensional models of psychopathology, and normative neurodevelopment

Searching for biomarkers has been a chief pursuit of the field of psychiatry. Toward this end, studies have catalogued candidate resting-state biomarkers in nearly all forms of mental disorder. However, it is becoming increasingly clear that these biomarkers lack specificity, limiting their capacity to yield clinical impact. We discuss three avenues of research that are overcoming this limitation: (i) the adoption of transdiagnostic research designs, which involve studying and explicitly comparing multiple disorders from distinct diagnostic axes of psychiatry; (ii) dimensional models of psychopathology that map the full spectrum of symptomatology and that cut across traditional disorder boundaries; and (iii) modeling individuals' unique functional connectomes throughout development. We provide a framework for tying these subfields together that draws on tools from machine learning and network science.

Longitudinal functional brain network reconfiguration in healthy aging

Healthy aging is associated with changes in cognitive performance and functional brain organization. In fact, cross-sectional studies imply lower modularity and significant heterogeneity in modular architecture across older subjects. Here, we used a longitudinal dataset consisting of four occasions of resting-state-fMRI and cognitive testing (spanning 4 years) in 150 healthy older adults. We applied a graph-theoretic analysis to investigate the time-evolving modular structure of the whole-brain network, by maximizing the multilayer modularity across four time points. Global flexibility, which reflects the tendency of brain nodes to switch between modules across time, was significantly higher in healthy elderly than in a temporal null model. Further, global flexibility, as well as network-specific flexibility of the default mode, frontoparietal control, and somatomotor networks, were significantly associated with age at baseline. These results indicate that older age is related to higher variability in modular organization. The temporal metrics were not associated with simultaneous changes in processing speed or learning performance in the context of memory encoding. Finally, this approach provides global indices for longitudinal change across a given time span and it may contribute to uncovering patterns of modular variability in healthy and clinical aging populations.

Dynamic Brain Connectivity in Resting State Functional MR Imaging

Dynamic functional connectivity adds another dimension to resting-state functional MR imaging analysis. In recent years, dynamic functional connectivity has been increasingly used in resting-state functional MR imaging, and several studies have demonstrated that dynamic functional connectivity patterns correlate with different physiologic and pathologic brain states. In fact, evidence suggests that dynamic functional connectivity is a more sensitive marker than static functional connectivity; therefore, it might be a promising tool to add to clinical functional neuroimaging. This article provides a broad overview of dynamic functional connectivity and reviews its general principles, techniques, and potential clinical applications.

The Acute Effects of the Atypical Dissociative Hallucinogen Salvinorin A on Functional Connectivity in the Human Brain

Salvinorin A (SA) is a κ-opioid receptor agonist and atypical dissociative hallucinogen found in Salvia divinorum. Despite the resurgence of hallucinogen studies, the effects of κ-opioid agonists on human brain function are not well-understood. This placebo-controlled, within-subject study used functional magnetic resonance imaging for the first time to explore the effects of inhaled SA on strength, variability, and entropy of functional connectivity (static, dynamic, and entropic functional connectivity, respectively, or sFC, dFC, and eFC). SA tended to decrease within-network sFC but increase between-network sFC, with the most prominent effect being attenuation of the default mode network (DMN) during the first half of a 20-min scan (i.e., during peak effects). SA reduced brainwide dFC but increased brainwide eFC, though only the former effect survived multiple comparison corrections. Finally, using connectome-based classification, most models trained on dFC network interactions could accurately classify the first half of SA scans. In contrast, few models trained on within- or between-network sFC and eFC performed above chance. Notably, models trained on within-DMN sFC and eFC performed better than models trained on other network interactions. This pattern of SA effects on human brain function is strikingly similar to that of other hallucinogens, necessitating studies of direct comparisons.

Development of Dynamic Functional Architecture during Early Infancy

Uncovering the moment-to-moment dynamics of functional connectivity (FC) in the human brain during early development is crucial for understanding emerging complex cognitive functions and behaviors. To this end, this paper leveraged a longitudinal resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging dataset from 51 typically developing infants and, for the first time, thoroughly investigated how the temporal variability of the FC architecture develops at the "global" (entire brain), "mesoscale" (functional system), and "local" (brain region) levels in the first 2 years of age. Our results revealed that, in such a pivotal stage, 1) the whole-brain FC dynamic is linearly increased; 2) the high-order functional systems tend to display increased FC dynamics for both within- and between-network connections, while the primary systems show the opposite trajectories; and 3) many frontal regions have increasing FC dynamics despite large heterogeneity in developmental trajectories and velocities. All these findings indicate that the brain is gradually reconfigured toward a more flexible, dynamic, and adaptive system with globally increasing but locally heterogeneous trajectories in the first 2 postnatal years, explaining why infants have rapidly developing high-order cognitive functions and complex behaviors.

Impact of childhood adversity on network reconfiguration dynamics during working memory in hypogonadal women

Many women with no history of cognitive difficulties experience executive dysfunction during menopause. Significant adversity during childhood negatively impacts executive function into adulthood and may be an indicator of women at risk of a mid-life cognitive decline. Previous studies have indicated that alterations in functional network connectivity underlie these negative effects of childhood adversity. There is growing evidence that functional brain networks are not static during executive tasks; instead, such networks reconfigure over time. Optimal dynamics are necessary for efficient executive function; while too little reconfiguration is insufficient for peak performance, too much reconfiguration (supra-optimal reconfiguration) is also maladaptive and associated with poorer performance. Here we examined the impact of adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) on network flexibility, a measure of dynamic reconfiguration, during a letter n-back task within three networks that support executive function: frontoparietal, salience, and default mode networks. Several animal and human subject studies have suggested that childhood adversity exerts lasting effects on executive function via serotonergic mechanisms. Tryptophan depletion (TD) was used to examine whether serotonin function drives ACE effects on network flexibility. We hypothesized that ACE would be associated with higher flexibility (supra-optimal flexibility) and that TD would further increase this measure. Forty women underwent functional imaging at two time points in this double-blind, placebo controlled, crossover study. Participants also completed the Penn Conditional Exclusion Test, a task assessing abstraction and mental flexibility. The effects of ACE and TD were evaluated using generalized estimating equations. ACE was associated with higher flexibility across networks (frontoparietal β = 0.00748, D = 2.79, p = 0.005; salience β = 0.00679, D = 3.02, p = 0.003; and default mode β = 0.00910, D = 3.53, p = 0.0004). While there was no interaction between ACE and TD, active TD increased network flexibility in both ACE groups in comparison to sham depletion (frontoparietal β = 0.00489, D = 2.15, p = 0.03; salience β = 0.00393, D = 1.91, p = 0.06; default mode β = 0.00334, D = 1.73, p = 0.08). These results suggest that childhood adversity has lasting impacts on dynamic reconfiguration of functional brain networks supporting executive function and that decreasing serotonin levels may exacerbate these effects.

The role of altered brain structural connectivity in resilience, vulnerability, and disease expression to schizophrenia

BACKGROUND

Schizophrenia (SCZ) is a highly heritable disorder associated with brain connectivity changes. Although the mechanism of disease expression and vulnerability of SCZ have been reported by previous studies, the mechanism of resilience to SCZ based on the brain structural connectivity is poorly understood. The goal of the present study was to identify the structural brain connectivity related with the resilience to SCZ, which is defined here as the capacity to avoid or delay the onset of SCZ in unaffected siblings of SCZ probands.

METHOD

We collected diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) data of 49 medication-naive, first-episode SCZ (FE-SCZ) patients, 56 unaffected siblings of SCZ probands (SIB-SCZ), and 90 healthy controls. Then we used graph theoretical approach to calculate the topological properties of the brain structural network, including global, subnetwork, and regional parameters. Finally, we compared the parameters between the three groups, and identified the brain structural network related to the resilience, vulnerability and disease expression to SCZ.

RESULTS

With respect to resilience, only the SIB-SCZ showed significantly increased connectivity in the subnetworks of the left cuneus-precuneus and left posterior cingulate gyrus-precuneus, and in brain areas of right supramarginal gyrus and right inferior temporal gyrus. With respect to vulnerability, both the FE-SCZ and SIB-SCZ had decreased cluster coefficients and local efficiency, and decreased nodal efficiency in the right medial superior frontal gyrus and right medial orbital superior frontal gyrus compared with the healthy controls. With respect to disease expression, only the FE-SCZ group showed decreased or increased global, subnetwork, and nodal connectivity in broader brain regions compared with the healthy controls.

CONCLUSION

Difference in the topological properties of brain structural connectivity not only reflect the underlying mechanism of vulnerability but also that of resilience to schizophrenia. Alteration in the brain structural connectivity associating with resilience and disease expression may contribute to the onset of SCZ.

Antidepressants normalize brain flexibility associated with multi-dimensional symptoms in major depressive patients

BACKGROUND

The fundamental pathophysiology of major depressive disorder (MDD) could be characterized by functional brain networks which tightly and dynamically connect into groups as communities, making the flexible brain possible to external multifarious demands. We aim to scrutinize what brain dynamics go awry in MDD and antidepressants effects on multi-dimensional symptoms.

METHODS

Thirty-five patients and thirty-five controls underwent resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). Patients were scanned before and after 8 or 12 weeks of pharmacotherapy. Group independent component analysis decomposed resting-state images to instinct networks and networks' integrated flexibility was calculated. Network flexibility between patients at baseline and after therapy were compared.

RESULTS

All patients completed the clinical trial and MRI scans. Following antidepressants treatment, we found significant normalization of reduced network flexibility in default mode network (DMN) and cognitive control network (CCN) of MDD patients. Selectively significant correlations between network flexibility and multi-dimensional symptoms such as anxiety/somatization and hysteresis factor were also found.

CONCLUSIONS

"Hypoflexible" CCN may involve in anxiety syndrome. Low flexibility in DMN may be indicative of hysteresis. These suggest an important pathophysiology of depressive manifestation of MDD. The antidepressant-induced normalization of the "hypoflexibility" suggests a selective pathway through which antidepressants may alleviate symptoms in depression.

Memantine Effects on Electroencephalographic Measures of Putative Excitatory/Inhibitory Balance in Schizophrenia

BACKGROUND

Abnormalities in cortical excitation and inhibition (E/I) balance are thought to underlie sensory and information processing deficits in schizophrenia. Deficits in early auditory information processing mediate both neurocognitive and functional impairment and appear to be normalized by acute pharmacologic challenge with the NMDA antagonist memantine (MEM).

METHODS

Thirty-six subjects with a diagnosis of schizophrenia and 31 healthy control subjects underwent electroencephalographic recordings. Subjects ingested either placebo or MEM (10 or 20 mg) in a double-blind, within-subject, crossover, randomized design. The aperiodic, 1/f-like scaling property of the neural power spectra, which is thought to index relative E/I balance, was estimated using a robust linear regression algorithm.

RESULTS

Patients with schizophrenia had greater aperiodic components compared with healthy control subjects (p < .01, d = 0.64), which was normalized after 20 mg MEM. Analysis revealed a significant dose × diagnosis interaction (p < .0001, d = 0.82). Furthermore, the MEM effect (change in aperiodic component in MEM vs. placebo conditions) was associated with baseline attention and vigilance (r = .54, p < .05) and MEM-induced enhancements in gamma power (r = -.60, p < .01).

CONCLUSIONS

Findings confirmed E/I balance abnormalities in schizophrenia that were normalized with acute MEM administration and suggest that neurocognitive profiles may predict treatment response based on E/I sensitivity. These data provide proof-of-concept evidence for the utility of E/I balance indices as metrics of acute pharmacologic sensitivity for central nervous system therapeutics.

Low-Dimensional Spatiotemporal Dynamics Underlie Cortex-wide Neural Activity

Cognition arises from the dynamic flow of neural activity through the brain. To capture these dynamics, we used mesoscale calcium imaging to record neural activity across the dorsal cortex of awake mice. We found that the large majority of variance in cortex-wide activity (∼75%) could be explained by a limited set of ∼14 "motifs" of neural activity. Each motif captured a unique spatiotemporal pattern of neural activity across the cortex. These motifs generalized across animals and were seen in multiple behavioral environments. Motif expression differed across behavioral states, and specific motifs were engaged by sensory processing, suggesting the motifs reflect core cortical computations. Together, our results show that cortex-wide neural activity is highly dynamic but that these dynamics are restricted to a low-dimensional set of motifs, potentially allowing for efficient control of behavior.

Multi-scale network regression for brain-phenotype associations

Brain networks are increasingly characterized at different scales, including summary statistics, community connectivity, and individual edges. While research relating brain networks to behavioral measurements has yielded many insights into brain‐phenotype relationships, common analytical approaches only consider network information at a single scale. Here, we designed, implemented, and deployed Multi‐Scale Network Regression (MSNR), a penalized multivariate approach for modeling brain networks that explicitly respects both edge‐ and community‐level information by assuming a low rank and sparse structure, both encouraging less complex and more interpretable modeling. Capitalizing on a large neuroimaging cohort (n = 1, 051), we demonstrate that MSNR recapitulates interpretable and statistically significant connectivity patterns associated with brain development, sex differences, and motion‐related artifacts. Compared to single‐scale methods, MSNR achieves a balance between prediction performance and model complexity, with improved interpretability. Together, by jointly exploiting both edge‐ and community‐level information, MSNR has the potential to yield novel insights into brain‐behavior relationships.

Resting state fMRI based multilayer network configuration in patients with schizophrenia

Novel methods for measuring large-scale dynamic brain organisation are needed to provide new biomarkers of schizophrenia. Using a method for modelling dynamic modular organisation (Mucha et al., 2010), evidence suggests higher 'flexibility' (switching between multilayer network communities) to be a feature of schizophrenia (Braun et al., 2016). The current study compared flexibility between 55 patients with schizophrenia and 72 controls (the COBRE Dataset). In addition, novel methods of 'between resting state network synchronisation' (BRSNS) and the probability of transition from one community to another were used to further describe group differences in dynamic community structure. There was significantly higher schizophrenia group flexibility scores in cerebellar (F (1124) = 9.33, p (FDR) = 0.017), subcortical (F (1124) = 13.14, p (FDR) = 0.005), and fronto-parietal task control (F (1124) = 7.19, p (FDR) = 0.033) resting state networks (RSNs), as well as in the left thalamus (MNI XYZ: -2, -13, 12; F(1, 124) = 17.1, p (FDR) < 0.001) and the right crus I (MNI XYZ: 35, -67, -34; F (1, 124) = 19.65, p (FDR) < 0.001). Flexibility in the left thalamus reflected transitions between communities covering default mode and sensory-somatomotor RSNs. BRSNS scores suggested altered dynamic inter-RSN modular configuration in schizophrenia. This study suggests less stable community structure in a schizophrenia group at an RSN and node level and provides novel methods of exploring dynamic community structure. Mediation of group differences by mean time window correlation did however suggest flexibility to be no better as a schizophrenia biomarker than simpler measures and a range of methodological choices affected results.

Data-Driven Approaches to Neuroimaging Analysis to Enhance Psychiatric Diagnosis and Therapy

Combining advanced neuroimaging with novel computational methods in network science and machine learning has led to increasingly meaningful descriptions of structure and function in both the normal and the abnormal brain, thereby contributing significantly to our understanding of psychiatric disorders as circuit dysfunctions. Despite its marked potential for psychiatric care, this approach has not yet extended beyond the research setting to any clinically useful applications. Here we review current developments in the study of neuroimaging data using network models and machine learning methods, with a focus on their promise in offering a framework for clinical translation. We discuss 3 potential contributions of these methods to psychiatric care: 1) a better understanding of psychopathology beyond current diagnostic boundaries; 2) individualized prediction of treatment response and prognosis; and 3) formal theories to guide the development of novel interventions. Finally, we highlight current obstacles and sketch a forward-looking perspective of how the application of machine learning and network modeling methods should proceed to accelerate their potential transformation of clinically useful tools.

Psychological resilience negatively correlates with resting-state brain network flexibility in young healthy adults: a dynamic functional magnetic resonance imaging study

Background

Psychological resilience is an important personality trait whose decrease is associated with many common psychiatric disorders, but the neural mechanisms underlying it remain largely unclear. In this study, we aimed to explore the neural correlates of psychological resilience in healthy adults by investigating its relationship with functional brain network flexibility, a fundamental dynamic feature of brain network defined by switching frequency of its modular community structures.

Methods

Resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) scans were acquired from 41 healthy adults, whose psychological resilience was quantified by the Connor-Davidson Resilience Scale (CD-RISC). Dynamic functional brain network was constructed for each subject, whose flexibility was calculated at all the global, subnetwork and region-of-interest (ROI) levels. After that, the associations between CD-RISC score and brain network flexibility were assessed at all levels by partial correlations controlling for age, sex, education and head motion. Correlation was also tested between the CD-RISC score and modularity of conventional static brain network for comparative purposes.

Results

The CD-RISC score was significant negatively correlated with the brain network flexibility at global level (r=-0.533, P=0.001), and with flexibility of the visual subnetwork at subnetwork level (r=-0.576, corrected P=0.002). Moreover, significant (corrected P<0.05) or trends for (corrected P<0.10) negative correlations were found between the CD-RISC score and flexibilities of a number of visual and default-mode areas at ROI level. Meanwhile, the modularity of static brain network did not reveal significant correlation with CD-RISC score (P>0.05).

Conclusions

Our results suggest that excessive fluctuations of the functional brain community structures during rest may be indicative of a lower psychological resilience, and the visual and default-mode systems may play crucial roles in such relationship. These findings may provide important implications for improving our understanding of the psychological resilience.

Predicting escitalopram monotherapy response in depression: The role of anterior cingulate cortex

Neuroimaging biomarkers of treatment efficacy can be used to guide personalized treatment in major depressive disorder (MDD). Escitalopram is recommended as first-line therapy for MDD and severe depression. An interesting hypothesis suggests that the reconfiguration of dynamic brain networks might provide important insights into antidepressant mechanisms. The present study assesses whether the spatiotemporal modulation across functional brain networks could serve as a predictor of effective antidepressant treatment with escitalopram. A total of 106 first-episode, drug-naïve patients and 109 healthy controls from three different multicenters underwent resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging. Patients were considered as responders if they had a reduction of at least 50% in Hamilton Rating Scale for Depression scores at endpoint (>2 weeks). Multilayer modularity framework was applied on the whole brain to construct features in relation to network dynamic characters that were used for multivariate pattern analysis. Linear soft-threshold support vector machine models were used to separate responders from nonresponders. The permutation tests demonstrated the robustness of discrimination performances. The discriminative regions formed a spatially distributed pattern with anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) as the hub in the default mode subnetwork. Interestingly, a significantly larger module allegiance of ACC was also found in treatment responders compared to nonresponders, suggesting high interactivities of ACC to other regions may be beneficial for the recovery after treatment. Consistent results across multicenters confirmed that ACC could serve as a predictor of escitalopram monotherapy treatment outcome, implying strong likelihood of replication in the future.

Functional control of electrophysiological network architecture using direct neurostimulation in humans

Chronically implantable neurostimulation devices are becoming a clinically viable option for treating patients with neurological disease and psychiatric disorders. Neurostimulation offers the ability to probe and manipulate distributed networks of interacting brain areas in dysfunctional circuits. Here, we use tools from network control theory to examine the dynamic reconfiguration of functionally interacting neuronal ensembles during targeted neurostimulation of cortical and subcortical brain structures. By integrating multimodal intracranial recordings and diffusion-weighted imaging from patients with drug-resistant epilepsy, we test hypothesized structural and functional rules that predict altered patterns of synchronized local field potentials. We demonstrate the ability to predictably reconfigure functional interactions depending on stimulation strength and location. Stimulation of areas with structurally weak connections largely modulates the functional hubness of downstream areas and concurrently propels the brain towards more difficult-to-reach dynamical states. By using focal perturbations to bridge large-scale structure, function, and markers of behavior, our findings suggest that stimulation may be tuned to influence different scales of network interactions driving cognition.

Brain stimulation devices capable of perturbing the physiological state of neural systems are rapidly gaining popularity for their potential to treat neurological and psychiatric disease. A root problem is that underlying dysfunction spans a large-scale network of brain regions, requiring the ability to control the complex interactions between multiple brain areas. Here, we use tools from network control theory to examine the dynamic reconfiguration of functionally interacting neuronal ensembles during targeted neurostimulation of cortical and subcortical brain structures. We demonstrate the ability to predictably reconfigure patterns of interactions between functional brain areas by modulating the strength and location of stimulation. Our findings have high significance for designing stimulation protocols capable of modulating distributed neural circuits in the human brain.

Network Neuroscience: A Framework for Developing Biomarkers in Psychiatry

Psychiatric disorders are disturbances of cognitive and behavioral processes mediated by the brain. Emerging evidence suggests that accurate biomarkers for psychiatric disorders might benefit from incorporating information regarding multiple brain regions and their interactions with one another, rather than considering local perturbations in brain structure and function alone. Recent advances in the field of applied mathematics generally - and network science specifically - provide a language to capture the complexity of interacting brain regions, and the application of this language to fundamental questions in neuroscience forms the emerging field of network neuroscience. This chapter provides an overview of the use and utility of network neuroscience for building biomarkers in psychiatry. The chapter begins with an overview of the theoretical frameworks and tools that encompass network neuroscience before describing applications of network neuroscience to the study of schizophrenia and major depressive disorder. With reference to work on genetic, molecular, and environmental correlates of network neuroscience features, the promises and challenges of network neuroscience for providing tools that aid in the diagnosis and the evaluation of treatment response in psychiatric disorders are discussed.

Dynamic community structure in major depressive disorder: A resting-state MEG study

BACKGROUND

Major Depressive Disorder (MDD), characterized by depressed mood or anhedonia, is associated with altered functional connectivity (FC) within and between large scale networks such as the Default Mode Network (DMN), the Central Executive Network (CEN) and the Salience Network (SN). Since aberrant FC exhibits temporal variability and could give rise to distorted reconfiguration of functional brain networks, an in-depth analysis of the community structure could provide further insight into the synchrony of networks. We hypothesized that alterations in dynamic network community structure in MDD could be temporally accompanied by disrupted conscious states of these three networks.

METHODS

26 MDD patients and 25 healthy controls were scanned using a whole-head resting-state Magnetoencephalography (MEG) machine. A novel multilayer modularity framework explored the functional modulation of these networks. Recruitment (R) and integration (I) provided the strength of interaction within networks or across networks, respectively.

RESULTS

The brain regions in the DMN, CEN and SN were transiently integrated and segmented in both patients and controls. R of CEN and I of SN were significantly greater in MDD compared to controls.

CONCLUSION

Intrinsic resting-state networks dynamically interact and reorganize into distinct functional modules in both patients and controls. However, the CEN "hyper-intertwines" with itself and SN "hyper-integrates" among the network of interest in depressed patients compared to controls. Network-level alterations in R and I revealed a more generalized system-level effect rather than a focal-wise effect from a neural dynamic perspective. This could potentially highlight an abnormal network-based mechanism in depression.

Altered dynamic global signal topography in antipsychotic-naive adolescents with early-onset schizophrenia

Schizophrenia (SCZ) is a severe neuropsychiatric disease associated with dysfunction of brain regions and networks. Recent, functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) studies have determined that the global signal (GS) is an important source of the local neuronal activity. However, the dynamics of this effect in SCZ remains unknown. To address this issue, 39 drug-naive patients with early-onset schizophrenia (EOS) and 31 age-, gender- and education-matched healthy controls underwent resting-state fMRI scans. Dynamic functional connectivity (DFC) was employed to assess the dynamic patterns of the GS in EOS. Dynamic analysis demonstrated that the topography of the GS in EOS can be divided into five different states. In the state1, the GS mainly affected the sensory regions. In the state2, the GS mainly affected the default mode network (DMN). In the state3, the GS mainly affected the frontoparietal network and the cingulate-opercular network. In the state4, the GS mainly affected the sensory and subcortical regions. In the state5, the GS mainly affected the sensory regions and DMN. In particular, the changes in the cerebellum, putamen and supramarginal gyrus was inversely proportional to the clinical symptoms. Our findings demonstrate that the influence of the GS on brain networks is dynamic and changes of this relationship may associate with clinical behavior in SCZ.

Atypical Flexibility in Dynamic Functional Connectivity Quantifies the Severity in Autism Spectrum Disorder

Resting-state functional connectivity (FC) analyses have shown atypical connectivity in autism spectrum disorder (ASD) as compared to typically developing (TD). However, this view emerges from investigating static FC overlooking the whole brain transient connectivity patterns. In our study, we investigated how age and disease influence the dynamic changes in functional connectivity of TD and ASD. We used resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging (rs-fMRI) data stratified into three cohorts: children (7-11 years), adolescents (12-17 years), and adults (18+ years) for the analysis. The dynamic variability in the connection strength and the modular organization in terms of measures such as flexiblity, cohesion strength, and disjointness were explored for each subject to characterize the differences between ASD and TD. In ASD, we observed significantly higher inter-subject dynamic variability in connection strength as compared to TD. This hyper-variability relates to the symptom severity in ASD. We also found that whole-brain flexibility correlates with static modularity only in TD. Further, we observed a core-periphery organization in the resting-state, with Sensorimotor and Visual regions in the rigid core; and DMN and attention areas in the flexible periphery. TD also develops a more cohesive organization of sensorimotor areas. However, in ASD we found a strong positive correlation of symptom severity with flexibility of rigid areas and with disjointness of sensorimotor areas. The regions of the brain showing high predictive power of symptom severity were distributed across the cortex, with stronger bearings in the frontal, motor, and occipital cortices. Our study demonstrates that the dynamic framework best characterizes the variability in ASD.

Evaluation of confound regression strategies for the mitigation of micromovement artifact in studies of dynamic resting-state functional connectivity and multilayer network modularity

Dynamic functional connectivity reflects the spatiotemporal organization of spontaneous brain activity in health and disease. Dynamic functional connectivity may be susceptible to artifacts induced by participant motion. This report provides a systematic evaluation of 12 commonly used participant-level confound regression strategies designed to mitigate the effects of micromovements in a sample of 393 youths (ages 8-22 years). Each strategy was evaluated according to a number of benchmarks, including (a) the residual association between participant motion and edge dispersion, (b) distance-dependent effects of motion on edge dispersion, (c) the degree to which functional subnetworks could be identified by multilayer modularity maximization, and (d) measures of module reconfiguration, including node flexibility and node promiscuity. Results indicate variability in the effectiveness of the evaluated pipelines across benchmarks. Methods that included global signal regression were the most consistently effective de-noising strategies.

Structural elements of a pH-sensitive inhibitor binding site in NMDA receptors

Context-dependent inhibition of N-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) receptors has important therapeutic implications for the treatment of neurological diseases that are associated with altered neuronal firing and signaling. This is especially true in stroke, where the proton concentration in the afflicted area can increase by an order of magnitude. A class of allosteric inhibitors, the 93-series, shows greater potency against GluN1-GluN2B NMDA receptors in such low pH environments, allowing targeted therapy only within the ischemic region. Here we map the 93-series compound binding site in the GluN1-GluN2B NMDA receptor amino terminal domain and show that the interaction of the N-alkyl group with a hydrophobic cage of the binding site is critical for pH-dependent inhibition. Mutation of residues in the hydrophobic cage alters pH-dependent potency, and remarkably, can convert inhibitors into potentiators. Our study provides a foundation for the development of highly specific neuroprotective compounds for the treatment of neurological diseases.

Context-dependent inhibition of NMDA receptors has important therapeutic implications for treatment of neurological diseases. Here, the authors use structural biology and biophysics to describe the basis for pH-dependent inhibition for a class of allosteric NMDAR inhibitors, called the 93-series.

The Transitions Between Dynamic Micro-States Reveal Age-Related Functional Network Reorganization

Normal dynamic change in human brain occurs with age increasing, yet much remains unknown regarding how brain develops, matures, and ages. Functional connectivity analysis of the resting-state brain is a powerful method for revealing the intrinsic features of functional networks, and micro-states, which are the intrinsic patterns of functional connectivity in dynamic network courses, and are suggested to be more informative of brain functional changes. The aim of this study is to explore the age-related changes in these micro-states of dynamic functional network. Three healthy groups were included: the young (ages 21-32 years), the adult (age 41-54 years), and the old (age 60-86 years). Sliding window correlation method was used to construct the dynamic connectivity networks, and then the micro-states were individually identified with clustering analysis. The distribution of age-related connectivity variations in several intrinsic networks for each micro-state was analyzed then. The micro-states showed substantial age-related changes in the transitions between states but not in the dwelling time. Also there was no age-related reorganization observed within any micro-state. But there were reorganizations observed in the transition between them. These results suggested that the identified micro-states represented certain underlying connectivity patterns in functional brain system, which are similar to the intrinsic cognitive networks or resources. In addition, the dynamic transitions between these states were probable mechanisms of reorganization or compensation in functional brain networks with age increasing.