Alteration of the cerebral inter-hemispheric resting-state functional connectivity in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis：a voxel-mirrored homotopic connectivity MRI study

Abstract

Objective To investigate the difference of cerebral inter-hemispheric functional connectivity between the patients with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis ( ALS) and healthy controls ( HC) by a newly developed voxel-mirrored homotopic connectivity ( VMHC) method based on resting-state functional MRI ( rs-fMRI) , as well as its correlation to the structural imaging indices and clinical neurological scales .Methods Twenty patients with ALS ( ALS group ) and 20 age-, and sex-matched healthy controls ( HC group) were examined by rs-fMRI and diffusion tensor imaging ( DTI ) on 3.0 T MR imaging system ( Siemens Trio Tim ).The rs-fMRI data preprocessing were performed using data processing assistant for rs-fMRI ( DPARSF) based on Matlab 2009a, and the rs-fMRI data analysis toolkit ( REST) with an automated VMHC approach was utilized to calculate and compare the VMHC correlation coefficients between the ALS group and the HC group[P 0.05).Conclusions Abnormal VMHC coefficients were detected in ALS patients.The decreased VMHC in ACC and M1 are associated with the reduced micro-structure integrity of CC, meanwhile, and they may be related to disease severity. Key words: Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis ; Magnetic resonance imaging ; Brain ;