Alterations Of Resting State Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging Regional Homogeneity In Preschool Boys With Autism Spectrum Disorders

Background:autism spectrum disorder(ASD)is a neurodevelopmental disorder in early childhood,which has been considered as a disease characterized by early changes of brain growth.With the growth of age and treatment intervention,ASD patients may have compensatory neural function.However,the results observed in most studies may be mixed with the changes after compensation.What’s more,there was significant gender difference in brain changes of ASD.Methods:This study was approved by the ethics committee of Shenzhen Children’s Hospital,and all participants signed the informed consent.MRI data were collected by 3.0T Siemens skyra scanner.Based on regional homogeneity(ReHo),the acquired resting state functional magnetic resonance imaging(fMRI)data sets,which included 86 boys with ASD and 54 typically developing(TD)boys,were used to detect regional brain activity.Pearson correlation analysis was used to study the relationship between abnormal ReHo value and the Childhood Autism Rating Scale(CARS),Autism Behavior Checklist(ABC),developmental quotient(DQ).Results:In the ASD group,we found increased ReHo in the right calcarine,as well as decreased ReHo in the opercular part of the left inferior frontal gyrus(IFG operc),the left middle temporal gyrus(MTG),the left angular gyrus(AG),and the right medial orbital frontal cortex(mOFC)(p<0.05,false discovery rate(FDR)correction).We did not find the correlation between the results of brain regions and the CARS,ABC.Conclusions:Our study found spontaneous activity changes in multiple brain regions,especially the visual and language-related areas of ASD,that may help to further understand the clinical characteristics of boys with ASD.