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. 2008 Oct 22;28(43):10844–10851. doi: 10.1523/JNEUROSCI.2964-08.2008

Figure 4.

Figure 4.

Association between the level of default mode functional connectivity and the microstructural organization of the cingulum tract. a illustrates the analysis that was used to compute the level of functional and structural connectivity between the regions of interest from the default mode network. In each individual dataset, the spatially averaged filtered rest-recorded time series (0.01–0.08 Hz) of the PCC and MFC of the default mode network cluster map were correlated, correcting for third-party effects. This resulted in a partial correlation between the PCC and MFC regions, which reflected the unique level of functional connectivity between these two key regions of the default mode network. The normality of the partial correlation coefficient was improved by using a Fisher's r-to-z transformation. For each individual dataset, the mean FA value of the found interconnecting cingulum tract was calculated by averaging the FA values along all points of the found interconnecting tracts. b, Correlating the level of default mode functional connectivity and mean cingulum FA revealed a significant positive correlation, correcting for age (r = 0.29; p < 0.05). This suggests a direct positive association between the microstructural organization of the cingulum tract and the level of functional connectivity of the default mode network during rest. Note that the partial correlation between the PCC and MFC regions represented the partial correlation between these regions, factoring out the pairwise correlations between the time series of the other resting-state network regions, including the two lateralized superior parietal regions of the default mode network. This relationship was found to be specific for the cingulum tract, because no significant association was found between the partial correlation between the PCC and MFC and the mean FA value of the total collection of reconstructed tracts in the brain. Furthermore, functional connectivity measures between the regions of the other clustered resting-state networks (Fig. 1, networks b–g) did not show a significant association with the mean FA value of the cingulum tract.