Cortical thickness reductions are evident in schizophrenia (SZ). Associations between antipsychotic medications (APMs) and cortical morphometry have been explored in SZ patients. This raises the question of whether the reconfiguration of morphological architecture by APM plays potential compensatory roles for abnormalities in the cerebral cortex. Structural magnetic resonance imaging was obtained from 127 medication-naive first-episode SZ patients and 133 matched healthy controls. Patients received 12 weeks of APM and were categorized as responders (n = 75) or nonresponders (NRs, n = 52) at follow-up. Using surface-based morphometry and structural covariance (SC) analysis, this study investigated the short-term effects of antipsychotics on cortical thickness and cortico-cortical covariance. Global efficiency was computed to characterize network integration of the large-scale structural connectome. The relationship between covariance and cortical thinning was examined by SC analysis among the top-n regions with thickness reduction. Widespread cortical thickness reductions were observed in pre-APM patients. Post-APM patients showed more reductions in cortical thickness, even in the frontotemporal regions without baseline reductions. Covariance analysis revealed strong cortico-cortical covariance and higher network integration in responders than in NRs. For the NRs, some of the prefrontal and temporal nodes were not covariant between the top-n regions with cortical thickness reduction. Antipsychotic effects are not restricted to a single brain region but rather exhibit a network-level covariance pattern. Neuroimaging connectomics highlights the positive effects of antipsychotics on the reconfiguration of brain architecture, suggesting that abnormalities in regional morphology may be compensated by increasing interregional covariance when symptoms are controlled by antipsychotics.

中文翻译：

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抗精神病药物对首发精神分裂症皮质形态测量网络级重构的影响

在精神分裂症 (SZ) 中，皮质厚度减少是明显的。已经在 SZ 患者中探索了抗精神病药物 (APM) 和皮质形态测量之间的关联。这提出了一个问题，即 APM 对形态结构的重新配置是否对大脑皮层的异常起到潜在的补偿作用。结构磁共振成像来自 127 名未用药的首发 SZ 患者和 133 名匹配的健康对照。患者接受了 12 周的 APM，并在随访中分为有反应者（n = 75）或无反应者（NR，n = 52）。使用基于表面的形态测量和结构协方差 (SC) 分析，本研究调查了抗精神病药对皮质厚度和皮质-皮质协方差的短期影响。计算全局效率以表征大规模结构连接组的网络集成。通过 SC 分析在厚度减少的前 n 个区域中检查协方差和皮质变薄之间的关系。在 APM 前患者中观察到广泛的皮质厚度减少。APM 后患者的皮质厚度减少更多，即使在没有基线减少的额颞区也是如此。协方差分析显示，与 NR 相比，响应者的皮质-皮质协方差和网络集成度更高。对于 NR，一些前额叶和颞叶节点在皮层厚度减少的前 n 个区域之间没有协变。抗精神病药的作用不限于单个大脑区域，而是表现出网络级协方差模式。