Altered properties of brain white matter structural networks in patients with nasopharyngeal carcinoma after radiotherap
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ORIGINAL RESEARCH
Altered properties of brain white matter structural networks in patients with nasopharyngeal carcinoma after radiotherapy Qinyuan Chen 1 & Xiaofei Lv 2, & Shufei Zhang 1 & Jiabao Lin 1 & Jie Song 1 & Bolin Cao 1 & Yihe Weng 1 & Li Li 2 & Ruiwang Huang 1
# Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature 2020
Abstract Previous neuroimaging studies revealed radiation-induced brain injury in patients with nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC) in the years after radiotherapy (RT). These injuries may be associated with structural and functional alterations. However, differences in the brain structural connectivity of NPC patients at different times after RT, especially in the early-delayed period, remain unclear. We acquired diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) data from three groups of NPC patients, 25 in the pre-RT (before RT) group, 22 in the early-delayed (1–6 months) period (post-RT-ED) group, and 33 in the late-delayed (>6 months) period (post-RT-LD) group. Then, we constructed brain white matter (WM) structural networks and used graph theory to compare their between-group differences. The NPC patients in the post-RT-ED group showed decreased global properties when compared with the pre-RT group. We also detected the nodes with between-group differences in nodal parameters. The nodes that differed between the postRT-ED and pre-RT groups were mainly located in the default mode (DMN) and central executive networks (CEN); those that differed between the post-RT-LD and pre-RT groups were located in the limbic system; and those that differed between the postRT-LD and post-RT-ED groups were mainly in the DMN. These findings may indicate that radiation-induced brain injury begins in the early-delayed period and that a reorganization strategy begins in the late-delayed period. Our findings may provide new insight into the pathogenesis of radiation-induced brain injury in normal-appearing brain tissue from the network perspective. Keywords Diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) . Radiotherapy . Graph theory . Brain injury . Rich club regions . Nasopharyngeal carcinoma
Abbreviations NPC Nasopharyngeal carcinoma RT Radiotherapy
WM pre-RT post-RT-ED
White matter Before radiotherapy The early-delayed period after radiotherapy
Qinyuan Chen and Xiaofei Lv contributed equally to this work. Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (https://doi.org/10.1007/s11682-019-00224-2) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. * Li Li [email protected] * Ruiwang Huang [email protected] 1
Center for the Study of Applied Psychology & MRI Center, Key Laboratory of Mental Health and Cognitive Science of Guangdong Province, School of Psychology, Institute for Brain Research and Rehabilitation, South China Normal University, Guangzhou 510631, People’s Republic of China
2
State Key Laboratory of Oncology in South China, Collaborative Innovation Center for Cancer Medicine, Guangdong Key Laboratory of Nasopharyngeal Carcinoma Diagnosis and Therapy, Sun Yat-sen Uni
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