Recent studies suggested that the rich club organization promoting global brain communication and integration of information, may be abnormally increased in obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). However, the structural and functional basis of this organization is still not very clear. Given the heritability of OCD, as suggested by previous family-based studies, we hypothesize that aberrant rich club organization may be a trait marker for OCD. In the present study, 32 patients with OCD, 30 unaffected first-degree relatives (FDR) and 32 healthy controls (HC) underwent diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). We examined the structural rich club organization and its interrelationship with functional coupling. Our results showed that rich club and peripheral connection strength in patients with OCD was lower than in HC, while it was intermediate in FDR. Finally, the coupling between structural and functional connections of the rich club, was decreased in FDR but not in OCD relative to HC, which suggests a buffering mechanism of brain functions in FDR. Overall, our findings suggest that alteration of the rich club organization may reflect a vulnerability biomarker for OCD, possibly buffered by structural and functional coupling of the rich club.

最近的研究表明，促进全球大脑交流和信息整合的富有俱乐部组织，可能在强迫症（OCD）中异常增加。但是，这个组织的结构和功能基础仍然不是很清楚。鉴于 OCD 的遗传性，正如先前基于家庭的研究所表明的那样，我们假设异常富有的俱乐部组织可能是 OCD 的特征标记。在本研究中，32 名强迫症患者、30 名未受影响的一级亲属 (FDR) 和 32 名健康对照 (HC) 接受了弥散张量成像 (DTI) 和功能磁共振成像 (fMRI)。我们检查了结构丰富的俱乐部组织及其与功能耦合的相互关系。我们的研究结果表明，OCD 患者丰富的球杆和外周连接强度低于 HC，而在 FDR 中处于中等水平。最后，富人俱乐部的结构和功能连接之间的耦合在 FDR 中减少，但在强迫症中相对于 HC 没有减少，这表明 FDR 中脑功能的缓冲机制。总体而言，我们的研究结果表明，富人俱乐部组织的改变可能反映了强迫症的脆弱性生物标志物，可能受到富人俱乐部的结构和功能耦合的缓冲。