Conservation of structural brain connectivity in people with multiple sclerosis

Abstract

Multiple sclerosis (MS) is a neurodegenerative disease that affects the central nervous system. Structures affected in MS include the corpus callosum, connecting the hemispheres. Studies have shown that in mammalian brains, structural connectivity is organized according to a conservation principle, an inverse relationship between intra- and interhemispheric connectivity. The aim of this study was to replicate this conservation principle in subjects with MS and to explore how the disease interacts with it. A multicentric dataset has been analyzed including 513 people with MS and 208 healthy controls from seven different centers. Structural connectivity was quantified through various connectivity measures, and graph analysis was used to study the behavior of intra- and interhemispheric connectivity. The association between the intra- and the interhemispheric connectivity showed a similar strength for healthy controls (r = 0.38, p < 0.001) and people with MS (r = 0.35, p < 0.001). Intrahemispheric connectivity was associated with white matter fraction (r = 0.48, p < 0.0001), lesion volume (r = −0.44, p < 0.0001), and the Symbol Digit Modalities Test (r = 0.25, p < 0.0001). Results show that this conservation principle seems to hold for people with MS. These findings support the hypothesis that interhemispheric connectivity decreases at higher cognitive decline and disability levels, while intrahemispheric connectivity increases to maintain the balance.