scholarly journals Optimizing and Interpreting Insular Functional Connectivity Maps Obtained During Acute Experimental Pain: The Effects of Global Signal and Task Paradigm Regression

2015 ◽  
Vol 5 (10) ◽  
pp. 649-657 ◽  
Author(s):  
James W. Ibinson ◽  
Keith M. Vogt ◽  
Kevin B. Taylor ◽  
Shiv B. Dua ◽  
Christopher J. Becker ◽  
...  
Author(s):  
Jae Wook Cho ◽  
Annachiara Korchmaros ◽  
Joshua T Vogelstein ◽  
Michael Milham ◽  
Ting Xu

AbstractCompelling evidence suggests the need for more data per individual to reliably map the functional organization of the human connectome. As the notion that ‘more data is better’ emerges as a golden rule for functional connectomics, researchers find themselves grappling with the challenges of how to obtain the desired amounts of data per participant in a practical manner, particularly for retrospective data aggregation. Increasingly, the aggregation of data across all fMRI scans available for an individual is being viewed as a solution, regardless of scan condition (e.g., rest, task, movie). A number of open questions exist regarding the aggregation process and the impact of different decisions on the reliability of resultant aggregate data. We leveraged the availability of highly sampled test-retest datasets to systematically examine the impact of data aggregation strategies on the reliability of cortical functional connectomics. Specifically, we compared functional connectivity estimates derived after concatenating from: 1) multiple scans under the same state, 2) multiple scans under different states (i.e. hybrid or general functional connectivity), and 3) subsets of one long scan. We also varied connectivity processing (i.e. global signal regression, ICA-FIX, and task regression) and estimation procedures. When the total number of time points is equal, and the scan state held constant, concatenating multiple shorter scans had a clear advantage over a single long scan. However, this was not necessarily true when concatenating across different fMRI states (i.e. task conditions), where the reliability from the aggregate data varied across states. Concatenating fewer numbers of states that are more reliable tends to yield higher reliability. Our findings provide an overview of multiple dependencies of data concatenation that should be considered to optimize reliability in analysis of functional connectivity data.


2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Gregory Simchick ◽  
Kelly M. Scheulin ◽  
Wenwu Sun ◽  
Sydney E. Sneed ◽  
Madison M. Fagan ◽  
...  

AbstractFunctional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) has significant potential to evaluate changes in brain network activity after traumatic brain injury (TBI) and enable early prognosis of potential functional (e.g., motor, cognitive, behavior) deficits. In this study, resting-state and task-based fMRI (rs- and tb-fMRI) were utilized to examine network changes in a pediatric porcine TBI model that has increased predictive potential in the development of novel therapies. rs- and tb-fMRI were performed one day post-TBI in piglets. Activation maps were generated using group independent component analysis (ICA) and sparse dictionary learning (sDL). Activation maps were compared to pig reference functional connectivity atlases and evaluated using Pearson spatial correlation coefficients and mean ratios. Nonparametric permutation analyses were used to determine significantly different activation areas between the TBI and healthy control groups. Significantly lower Pearson values and mean ratios were observed in the visual, executive control, and sensorimotor networks for TBI piglets compared to controls. Significant differences were also observed within several specific individual anatomical structures within each network. In conclusion, both rs- and tb-fMRI demonstrate the ability to detect functional connectivity disruptions in a translational TBI piglet model, and these disruptions can be traced to specific affected anatomical structures.


2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hannes Almgren ◽  
Frederik Van de Steen ◽  
Adeel Razi ◽  
Karl Friston ◽  
Daniele Marinazzo

AbstractThe influence of the global BOLD signal on resting state functional connectivity in fMRI data remains a topic of debate, with little consensus. In this study, we assessed the effects of global signal regression (GSR) on effective connectivity within and between resting-state networks – as estimated with dynamic causal modelling (DCM) for resting state fMRI (rsfMRI). DCM incorporates a forward (generative) model that quantifies the contribution of different types of noise (including global measurement noise), effective connectivity, and (neuro)vascular processes to functional connectivity measurements. DCM analyses were applied to two different designs; namely, longitudinal and cross-sectional designs. In the modelling of longitudinal designs, we included four extensive longitudinal resting state fMRI datasets with a total number of 20 subjects. In the analysis of cross-sectional designs, we used rsfMRI data from 361 subjects from the Human Connectome Project. We hypothesized that (1) GSR would have no discernible impact on effective connectivity estimated with DCM, and (2) GSR would be reflected in the parameters representing global measurement noise. Additionally, we performed comparative analyses of the informative value of data with and without GSR. Our results showed negligible to small effects of GSR on connectivity within small (separately estimated) RSNs. For between-network connectivity, we found two important effects: the effect of GSR on between-network connectivity (averaged over all connections) was negligible to small, while the effect of GSR on individual connections was non-negligible. Contrary to our expectations, we found either no effect (in the longitudinal designs) or a non-specific (cross-sectional design) effect of GSR on parameters representing (global) measurement noise. Data without GSR were found to be more informative than data with GSR; however, in small resting state networks the precision of posterior estimates was greater using data after GSR. In conclusion, GSR is a minor concern in DCM studies; however, individual between-network connections (as opposed to average between-network connectivity) and noise parameters should be interpreted quantitatively with some caution. The Kullback-Leibler divergence of the posterior from the prior, together with the precision of posterior estimates, might offer a useful measure to assess the appropriateness of GSR, when nuancing data features in resting state fMRI.


2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Narges Moradi ◽  
Mehdy Dousty ◽  
Roberto C. Sotero

AbstractResting-state functional connectivity MRI (rs-fcMRI) is a common method for mapping functional brain networks. However, estimation of these networks is affected by the presence of a common global systemic noise, or global signal (GS). Previous studies have shown that the common preprocessing steps of removing the GS may create spurious correlations between brain regions. In this paper, we decompose fMRI signals into 5 spatial and 3 temporal intrinsic mode functions (SIMF and TIMF, respectively) by means of the empirical mode decomposition (EMD), which is an adaptive data-driven method widely used to analyze nonlinear and nonstationary phenomena. For each SIMF, brain connectivity matrices were computed by means of the Pearson correlation between TIMFs of different brain areas. Thus, instead of a single connectivity matrix, we obtained 5 × 3 = 15 functional connectivity matrices. Given the high value obtained for large-scale topological measures such as transitivity, in the low spatial maps (SIMF3, SIMF4, and SIMF5), our results suggest that these maps can be considered as spatial global signal masks. Thus, the spatiotemporal EMD of fMRI signals automatically regressed out the GS, although, interestingly, the removed noisy component was voxel-specific. We compared the performance of our method with the conventional GS regression and to the results when the GS was not removed. While the correlation pattern identified by the other methods suffers from a low level of precision, our approach demonstrated a high level of accuracy in extracting the correct correlation between different brain regions.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kirk Graff ◽  
Ryann Tansey ◽  
Amanda Ip ◽  
Christiane Rohr ◽  
Dennis Dimond ◽  
...  

AbstractFunctional connectivity magnetic resonance imaging (FC-MRI) has been widely used to investigate neurodevelopment. However, FC-MRI is vulnerable to head motion, which is associated with age and distorts FC estimates. Numerous preprocessing strategies have been developed to mitigate confounds, each with advantages and drawbacks. Preprocessing strategies for FC-MRI have typically been validated and compared using resting state data from adults. However, FC-MRI in young children presents a unique challenge due to relatively high head motion and a growing use of passive viewing paradigms to mitigate motion. This highlights a need to compare processing choices in pediatric samples. To this end, we leveraged longitudinal, passive viewing fMRI data collected from 4 to 8-year-old children. We systematically investigated combinations of widely used and debated preprocessing strategies, namely global signal regression, volume censoring, ICA-AROMA, and bandpass filtering. We implemented commonly used metrics of noise removal (i.e. quality control-functional connectivity), metrics sensitive to individual differences (i.e. connectome fingerprinting), and, because data was collected during a passive viewing task, we also assessed the impact on stimulus-evoked responses (i.e. intersubject correlations; ISC). We found that the most efficacious pipeline included censoring, global signal regression, bandpass filtering, and head motion parameter regression. Despite the drawbacks of noise-mitigation steps, our findings show benefits for both noise removal and information retention in a high-motion early childhood sample.Highlights- We evaluated 27 preprocessing pipelines in passive viewing data from young children- Pipelines were evaluated on noise-removed and information retained- Pipelines that included censoring and GSR outperformed alternatives across benchmarks- For high-motion scans, preprocessing choices substantially alter connectomes


2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anzar Abbas ◽  
Yasmine Bassil ◽  
Shella Keilholz

Individuals with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder have been shown to have disrupted functional connectivity in the default mode and task positive networks. Traditional fMRI analysis techniques that focus on static changes in functional connectivity have been successful in identifying differences between healthy controls and individuals with ADHD. However, such analyses are unable to explain the mechanisms behind the functional connectivity differences observed. Here, we study dynamic changes in functional connectivity in individuals with ADHD through investigation of quasi-periodic patterns (QPPs). QPPs are reliably recurring low-frequency spatiotemporal patterns in the brain linked to infra-slow electrical activity. They have been shown to contribute to functional connectivity observed through static analysis techniques. We find that QPPs contribute to functional connectivity specifically in regions that are disrupted during ADHD. Individuals with ADHD also show differences in the spatiotemporal pattern observed within the QPPs. This difference results in a weaker contribution of QPPs to functional connectivity in the default mode and task positive networks. We conclude that quasi-periodic patterns provide insight into the mechanisms behind functional connectivity differences seen in individuals with ADHD. This allows for a better understanding of the etiology of the disorder and development of effective treatments.


PLoS ONE ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 16 (4) ◽  
pp. e0249947
Author(s):  
Christian Habeck ◽  
Qolamreza Razlighi ◽  
Yaakov Stern

Functional connectivity, both in resting state and task performance, has steadily increased its share of neuroimaging research effort in the last 1.5 decades. In the current study, we investigated the predictive utility regarding behavioral performance and task information for 240 participants, aged 20–77, for both voxel activation and functional connectivity in 12 cognitive tasks, belonging to 4 cognitive reference domains (Episodic Memory, Fluid Reasoning, Perceptual Speed, and Vocabulary). We also added a model only comprising brain-structure information not specifically acquired during performance of a cognitive task. We used a simple brain-behavioral prediction technique based on Principal Component Analysis (PCA) and regression and studied the utility of both modalities in quasi out-of-sample predictions, using split-sample simulations (= 5-fold Monte Carlo cross validation) with 1,000 iterations for which a regression model predicting a cognitive outcome was estimated in a training sample, with a subsequent assessment of prediction success in a non-overlapping test sample. The sample assignments were identical for functional connectivity, voxel activation, and brain structure, enabling apples-to-apples comparisons of predictive utility. All 3 models that were investigated included the demographic covariates age, gender, and years of education. A minimal reference model using simple linear regression with just these 3 covariates was included for comparison as well and was evaluated with the same resampling scheme as described above. Results of the comparison between voxel activation and functional connectivity were mixed and showed some dependency on cognitive outcome; however, mean differences in predictive utility between voxel activation and functional connectivity were rather small in terms of within-modality variability or predictive success. More notably, only in the case of Fluid Reasoning did concurrent functional neuroimaging provided compelling about cognitive performance beyond structural brain imaging or the minimal reference model.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Niv Tik ◽  
Abigail Livny ◽  
Shachar Gal ◽  
Karny Gigi ◽  
Galia Tsarfaty ◽  
...  

AbstractBACKGROUNDPatients suffering from schizophrenia demonstrate abnormal brain activity, as well as alterations in patterns of functional connectivity assessed by functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). Previous studies in healthy participants suggest a strong association between resting-state functional connectivity and task-evoked brain activity that could be detected at an individual level, and show that brain activation in various tasks could be predicted from task-free fMRI scans. In the current study we aimed to predict brain activity in patients diagnosed with schizophrenia, using a prediction model based on healthy individuals exclusively. This offers novel insights regarding the interrelations between brain connectivity and activity in schizophrenia.METHODSWe generated a prediction model using a group of 80 healthy controls that performed the well-validated N-back task, and used it to predict individual variability in task-evoked brain activation in 20 patients diagnosed with schizophrenia.RESULTSWe demonstrated a successful prediction of individual variability in the task-evoked brain activation based on resting-state functional connectivity. The predictions were highly sensitive, reflected by high correlations between predicted and actual activation maps (Median = 0.589, SD = 0.193) and specific, evaluated by a Kolomogrov-Smirnov test (D = 0.25, p < 0.0001).CONCLUSIONSA Successful prediction of brain activity from resting-state functional connectivity highlights the strong coupling between the two. Moreover, our results support the notion that even though resting-state functional connectivity and task-evoked brain activity are frequently reported to be altered in schizophrenia, the relations between them remains unaffected. This may allow to generate task activity maps for clinical populations without the need the actually perform the task.


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