Accumulating evidence shows that Coronavirus Disease 19 (COVID-19) survivors may encounter prolonged mental issues, especially post-traumatic stress symptoms (PTSS). Despite manifesting a plethora of behavioral or mental issues in COVID-19 survivors, previous studies illustrated that static brain functional networks of these survivors remain intact. The insignificant results could be due to the conventional statistic network analysis was unable to reveal information that can vary considerably in different temporal scales. In contrast, time-varying characteristics of the dynamic functional networks may help reveal important brain abnormalities in COVID-19 survivors. To test this hypothesis, we assessed PTSS and collected functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) with COVID-19 survivors discharged from hospitals and matched controls. Results showed that COVID-19 survivors self-reported a significantly higher PTSS than controls. Tapping into the moment-to-moment variations of the fMRI data, we captured the dynamic functional network connectivity (dFNC) states, and three discriminative reoccurring brain dFNC states were identified. First of all, COVID-19 survivors showed an increased occurrence of a dFNC state with heterogeneous patterns between sensorimotor and visual networks. More importantly, the occurrence rate of this state was significantly correlated with the severity of PTSS. Finally, COVID-19 survivors demonstrated decreased topological organizations in this dFNC state than controls, including the node strength, degree, and local efficiency of the supplementary motor area. To conclude, our findings revealed the altered temporal characteristics of functional networks and their associations with PTSS due to COVID- 19. The current results highlight the importance of evaluating dynamic functional network changes with COVID-19 survivors.

越来越多的证据表明，冠状病毒病 19 (COVID-19) 幸存者可能会遇到长期的精神问题，尤其是创伤后压力症状 (PTSS)。尽管 COVID-19 幸存者表现出过多的行为或心理问题，但先前的研究表明，这些幸存者的静态脑功能网络保持完好。不显着的结果可能是由于传统的统计网络分析无法揭示在不同时间尺度上可能有很大差异的信息。相比之下，动态功能网络的时变特征可能有助于揭示 COVID-19 幸存者的重要大脑异常。为了验证这一假设，我们评估了 PTSS 并收集了从医院出院的 COVID-19 幸存者和匹配对照的功能磁共振成像 (fMRI)。结果表明，COVID-19 幸存者自我报告的 PTSS 明显高于对照组。利用 fMRI 数据的即时变化，我们捕获了动态功能网络连接 (dFNC) 状态，并确定了三个有区别的重复出现的大脑 dFNC 状态。首先，COVID-19 幸存者表现出 dFNC 状态的发生率增加，在感觉运动和视觉网络之间具有异质模式。更重要的是，这种状态的发生率与PTSS的严重程度显着相关。最后，与对照组相比，COVID-19 幸存者在此 dFNC 状态下的拓扑组织减少，包括辅助运动区域的节点强度、程度和局部效率。总结一下，