Cortico-Cerebellar Structural Connectivity Is Related to Residual Motor Output in Chronic Stroke.
Functional imaging studies have argued that interactions between cortical motor areas and the cerebellum are relevant for motor output and recovery processes after stroke. However, the impact of the underlying structural connections is poorly understood. To investigate this, diffusion-weighted brain imaging was conducted in 26 well-characterized chronic stroke patients (aged 63 ± 1.9 years, 18 males) with supratentorial ischemic lesions and 26 healthy participants. Probabilistic tractography was used to reconstruct reciprocal cortico-cerebellar tracts and to relate their microstructural integrity to residual motor functioning applying linear regression modeling. The main finding was a significant association between cortico-cerebellar structural connectivity and residual motor function, independent from the level of damage to the cortico-spinal tract. Specifically, white matter integrity of the cerebellar outflow tract, the dentato-thalamo-cortical tract, was positively related to both general motor output and fine motor skills. Additionally, the integrity of the descending cortico-ponto-cerebellar tract contributed to rather fine motor skills. A comparable structure-function relationship was not evident in the controls. The present study provides first tract-related structural data demonstrating a critical importance of distinct cortico-cerebellar connections for motor output after stroke.
['Schulz|Robert|R|', 'Frey|Benedikt M|BM|', 'Koch|Philipp|P|', 'Zimerman|Maximo|M|', 'Bönstrup|Marlene|M|', 'Feldheim|Jan|J|', 'Timmermann|Jan E|JE|', 'Schön|Gerhard|G|', 'Cheng|Bastian|B|', 'Thomalla|Götz|G|', 'Gerloff|Christian|C|', 'Hummel|Friedhelm C|FC|']
D000368:Aged D009320:Atrial Natriuretic Factor D002545:Brain Ischemia D002531:Cerebellum D002540:Cerebral Cortex D002908:Chronic Disease D038524:Diffusion Magnetic Resonance Imaging D056324:Diffusion Tensor Imaging D005260:Female D006801:Humans D016014:Linear Models D008297:Male D008875:Middle Aged D009043:Motor Activity D009434:Neural Pathways D020521:Stroke D066127:White Matter
cerebellum recovery dentato-thalamo-cortical cortico-ponto-cerebellar motor cortex