Reconfiguration of dominant coupling modes in mild traumatic brain injury mediated by δ-band activity: A resting state MEG study

Abstract

During the last few years, rich-club (RC) organization has been studied as a possible brain-connectivity organization model for large-scale brain networks. At the same time, empirical and simulated data of neurophysiological models have demonstrated the significant role of intra-frequency and inter-frequency coupling among distinct brain areas. The current study investigates further the importance of these couplings using recordings of resting-state magnetoencephalographic activity obtained from 30 mild traumatic brain injury (mTBI) subjects and 50 healthy controls. Intra-frequency and inter-frequency coupling modes are incorporated in a single graph to detect group differences within individual rich-club subnetworks (type I networks) and networks connecting RC nodes with the rest of the nodes (type II networks). Our results show a higher probability of inter-frequency coupling for (δ-γ₁), (δ-γ₂), (θ-β), (θ-γ₂), (α-γ₂), (γ₁-γ₂) and intra-frequency coupling for (γ₁-γ₁) and (δ-δ) for both type I and type II networks in the mTBI group. Additionally, mTBI and control subjects can be correctly classified with high accuracy (98.6%), whereas a general linear regression model can effectively predict the subject group using the ratio of type I and type II coupling in the (δ, θ), (δ, β), (δ, γ₁), and (δ, γ₂) frequency pairs. These findings support the presence of an RC organization simultaneously with dominant frequency interactions within a single functional graph. Our results demonstrate a hyperactivation of intrinsic RC networks in mTBI subjects compared to controls, which can be seen as a plausible compensatory mechanism for alternative frequency-dependent routes of information flow in mTBI subjects.

Keywords: brain network models; cross-frequency coupling; intrinsic networks; magnetoencephalography (MEG); mild traumatic brain injury (mTBI).