Fig 1. Preserved small-world topological organization of NMOSD patients.

Average metrics are extracted for each brain network for healthy subjects and patients ((A) functional connectivity, gathering information on correlations; (B) global efficiency, related to the shortest path; (C) clustering, quantifying connections of the neighborhood; (D) modularity, measuring the possibility of dividing the network into subgroups of nodes); (E) degree distribution, the probability distribution of the degree of a node in the network (patients in red and healthy volunteers in black). No statistical differences were observed between NMOSD patients (grey) and healthy subjects (white) for all metrics used. This shows that the small-world topology is preserved for NMOSD patients despite the disability that is already present on clinical assessment of the patients. Abbreviations. NMOSD, neuromyelitis optica spectrum disorder.