Feng Shi1, Yong Fan1, Pew-Thian
Yap1, Weili Lin1, John Gilmore2, Dinggang
Shen1
1Department of Radiology and BRIC,
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC, United States; 2Department
of Psychiatry, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC,
United States
We
evaluated the brain structural networks on three groups of subjects, as high
risk newborns of schizophrenic parents, healthy newborns, and healthy adults.
All three groups showed small-world network properties. From healthy newborns
to healthy adults as brain develops, global efficiency is increased while
local efficiency is decreased, with reduced regularity and enhanced
randomness. This suggests that brain networks develop from a local to
distributed organization. However, high risk newborns showed a more
localized pattern and lack global integration compared with healthy newborns.
This indicates that a delay might have occurred during brain development of
the high risk group.
Keywords