DOI: 10.5061/dryad.88q04
title: Data from: Integrated analysis and visualization of group differences in structural and functional brain connectivity: applications in typical ageing and schizophrenia

description: Structural and functional brain connectivity are increasingly used to
 identify and analyze group differences in studies of brain disease. This
 study presents methods to analyze uni- and bi-modal brain connectivity and
 evaluate their ability to identify differences. Novel visualizations of
 significantly different connections comparing multiple metrics are
 presented. On the global level, “bi-modal comparison plots” show the
 distribution of uni- and bi-modal group differences and the relationship
 between structure and function. Differences between brain lobes are
 visualized using “worm plots”. Group differences in connections are
 examined with an existing visualization, the “connectogram”. These
 visualizations were evaluated in two proof-of-concept studies: (1)
 middle-aged versus elderly subjects; and (2) patients with schizophrenia
 versus controls. Each included two measures derived from diffusion
 weighted images and two from functional magnetic resonance images. The
 structural measures were minimum cost path between two anatomical regions
 according to the “Statistical Analysis of Minimum cost path based
 Structural Connectivity” method and the average fractional anisotropy
 along the fiber. The functional measures were Pearson’s correlation and
 partial correlation of mean regional time series. The relationship between
 structure and function was similar in both studies. Uni-modal group
 differences varied greatly between connectivity types. Group differences
 were identified in both studies globally, within brain lobes and between
 regions. In the aging study, minimum cost path was highly effective in
 identifying group differences on all levels; fractional anisotropy and
 mean correlation showed smaller differences on the brain lobe and regional
 levels. In the schizophrenia study, minimum cost path and fractional
 anisotropy showed differences on the global level and within brain lobes;
 mean correlation showed small differences on the lobe level. Only
 fractional anisotropy and mean correlation showed regional differences.
 The presented visualizations were helpful in comparing and evaluating
 connectivity measures on multiple levels in both studies.
description: MGH_regressionConnectome file format file that holds networkX networks for each connectivity type. Each connection in the network represents an ordinary least squares regression with group membership as the variable of interest and age and gender as covariates. For each variable, covariable and a constant term, the beta, pvalue and t-statistic is stored.MGHconnectomestar.gz holding the connectome information of each subject included in the MGH proof-of-concept study. Each subject has a connectome file format (cff) file, and each cff file holds networkX networks for each network type considered.MGH_includedSubjectsList of subjects included in the MGH analysis. Each subject's URSI identifier, type (patient/control), age, gender, and ses is provided. Additional information about subjects can be obtained from the MIND Clinical Imaging Consortium.