The effect of δ (delta)-catenin on small-world brain network properties in breast cancer patients before chemotherapy

Abstract

Our study is to investigate the effect of δ-catenin on the alterations in small-world brain network before chemotherapy in breast cancer patients by rs-fMRI, based on the hypothesis that different δ-catenin expressions have independent brain imaging characteristics. A total of 105 cases of pathologically confirmed breast cancer were collected and divided into high δ-catenin expression (DH, 52 cases) and low expression (DL, 53 cases) groups. Also, 36 healthy women matched for age were enrolled as a healthy control group (HC). The results show differences in several network topology attributes among the three groups. Furthermore, in addition to differences in nodal efficiency, betweenness and degree centrality metrics between the patient group and HC in multiple brain regions, there were also alterations between the DL and DH groups in brain regions such as the supramarginal and inferior frontal gyrus, which supports our hypothesis. Neuropsychological scores also showed that the DL group had significantly shorter short and long-term memory times than the DH group. The study concluded that different states of δ-catenin had significantly different effects on the attributes of the breast cancer patients' brain network and had characteristic impacts on some brain regions. They could also be involved in executive function-related cognitive functions and changes in regulating emotions.