Sparsity Dependent Metrics Depict Alteration of Brain Network Connectivity in Parkinson's Disease

To date, regional brain atrophy unfolded using neuroimaging methods is observed to be the signature of Parkinson's disease (PD). In addition, graph theory-based studies are proving altered structural connectivity in PD. This motivated us to employ regional grey matter volume of PD patients (N=70) for comparative network analysis with an equal number of age- and gender-matched healthy controls (HC). In the current study, normalized grey matter maps obtained from structural magnetic resonance imaging (sMRI) were parcellated into 56 ROI (regions of interest) for construction of symmetric matrix using partial correlation between every pair of regional grey matter volumes. Sparsity thresholding was used to binarize the matrices and MATLAB functions from brain connectivity toolbox were employed to obtain the connectivity metrics. We observed PD with a significantly lower clustering coefficient as well as local efficiency at higher sparsities (above 0.9 and 0.84, respectively) with p<0.05. The right fusiform gyrus was found to be the conserved hub, besides disruption of four hubs and regeneration of five other hubs. Lower clustering coefficient and local efficiency were indicative of reduced local integration and information processing, respectively. Hence, we suggest that global clustering coefficient and local efficiency could have a pivotal role in evaluating network topology. Thereby, our findings confirmed impairment of normal structural brain network topology reflecting disconnectivity mechanisms in PD. Clinical Relevance - Analyzing structural brain connectivity in Parkinson's disease might provide the researchers and clinicians with a signature pattern of the disease to discriminate patients from normal controls.