Quantitative Assessment of Resting‐State Functional Connectivity MRI to Differentiate Amnestic Mild Cognitive Impairment, Late‐Onset Alzheimer’s Disease From Normal Subjects
Abstract
Background
Alzheimer disease (AD) is a neurological disorder with brain network dysfunction. Investigation of the brain network functional connectivity (FC) alterations using resting‐state functional MRI (rs‐fMRI) can provide valuable information about the brain network pattern in early AD diagnosis.
Purpose
To quantitatively assess FC patterns of resting‐state brain networks and graph theory metrics (GTMs) to identify potential features for differentiation of amnestic mild cognitive impairment (aMCI) and late‐onset AD from normal.
Study Type
Prospective.
Subjects
A total of 14 normal, 16 aMCI, and 13 late‐onset AD.
Field Strength/Sequence
A 3.0 T; rs‐fMRI: single‐shot 2D‐EPI and T1‐weighted structure: MPRAGE.
Assessment
By applying bivariate correlation coefficient and Fisher transformation on the time series of predefined ROIs’ pairs, correlation coefficient matrixes and ROI‐to‐ROI connectivity (RRC …