Altered small-world properties in newborns at high risk for schizophrenia

Introduction: There is growing evidence that the offspring of schizophrenic parents is at high risk for schizophrenia (SCZ). Disrupted brain connectivity has been widely observed in studies on adults with SCZ. So far, however, the brain connectivity pattern of the high risk offspring is still unclear. Brain network analysis has been employed recently for evaluating the brain connectivity properties in various imaging modalities such as MRI, EEG, MEG, fMRI, and DTI [1]. Human brain networks demonstrate so-called small-world network properties, i.e., they are densely locally clustered and highly globally integrated, with characteristics in between regular lattices and random networks. We hypothesize that the brain network of individuals of high risk for SCZ may be altered even at their early development stage. We tested this hypothesis by studying brain networks constructed from brain images of high risk newborns, and compared their network properties with those derived from age-matched healthy newborns, as well as healthy adults.