Increased striatal coupling one week after ischemic stroke revealed by ultrafast functional MRI

Abstract Background Network reorganization following ischemic stroke is thought to play a role in recovery. Although cortico-cortical reorganization is widely established, changes in interhemispheric striatal connections following ischemia remain poorly understood, even when stroke occurs in motor areas. Given the importance of the striatum to motor function, we investigated network-level striatal coupling in stroke using ultrafast resting-state fMRI, which has recently been shown to facilitate the dissection of synchronous oscillatory activity better than its conventional ∼1 sec time-resolution counterparts. Methods A cohort of (N=18) sedated rats were randomized and N=9 rats underwent unilateral photothrombotic ischemic lesioning in motor cortex. One week after the lesion, when plasticity and recovery are well established, all animals were scanned on a 9.4T MRI scanner using a cryogenic coil using an ultrafast resting-state functional MRI sequence with temporal resolution of 90 ms. Data were collected for 24 minutes, and spectral power, phase locking, and functional connectivity were quantified. Histology was performed to confirm lesion extent. Results While cortico-cortical power, connectivity and synchrony were diminished one week post-stroke as expected, we surprisingly found increased striato-striatal power, synchrony and functional connectivity in the stroked group compared with the control group. In stroked animals, the spectral power in the ultraslow oscillation frequency band (0.02-0.4 Hz) significantly increased in the striatum while decreasing in the cortex. When data were undersampled to “conventional” fMRI temporal resolution (900 ms), the striatal effects were lost, revealing the power of ultrafast fMRI approaches in unveiling such phenomena. Conclusions Increased striato-striatal coupling, in the form of increased synchrony, spectral power, and functional connectivity, was revealed by ultrafast resting-state fMRI, but not conventional temporal resolution resting-state fMRI. Our findings suggest more involvement of subcortical areas in network reorganization than previously thought.