Machine Learning Analysis Classifies Patients with Primary Angle-Closure Glaucoma Using Abnormal Brain White Matter Function

Abstract

Qiu-Yu Tang,1,* Yu-Lin Zhong,2,* Xin-Miao Wang,3,* Bing-Lin Huang,1 Wei-Guo Qin,4 Xin Huang2 1College of Clinical Medicine, Jiangxi University of Chinese Medicine, Nanchang City, Jiangxi, 330004, People’s Republic of China; 2Department of Ophthalmology, Jiangxi Provincial People’s Hospital, The First Affiliated Hospital of Nanchang Medical College, Nanchang, Jiangxi, 330006, People’s Republic of China; 3School of Ophthalmology and Optometry, Jiangxi Medical College, Nanchang University, Nanchang, Jiangxi, 330000, People’s Republic of China; 4Department of Cardiothoracic Surgery, The 908th Hospital of Chinese People’s Liberation Army Joint Logistic Support Force’, Nanchang, People’s Republic of China*These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence: Xin Huang, Department of ophthalmology, Jiangxi Provincial People’s Hospital, No. 152, Ai Guo Road, Dong Hu District, Nanchang, Jiangxi, 330006, People’s Republic of China, Tel [phone], Email [email protected]: Primary angle-closure glaucoma (PACG) is a globally prevalent, irreversible eye disease leading to blindness. Previous neuroimaging studies demonstrated that PACG patients were associated with gray matter function changes. However, whether the white matter(WM) function changes in PACG patients remains unknown. The purpose of the study is to investigate WM function changes in the PACG patients.Methods: In total, 40 PACG patients and 40 well-matched HCs participated in our study and underwent resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging (rs-fMRI) scans. We compared between-group differences between PACG patients and HC in the WM function using amplitude of low-frequency fluctuations (ALFF). In addition, the SVM method was applied to the construction of the PACG classification model.Results: Compared with the HC group, ALFF was attenuated in right posterior thalamic radiation (include optic radiation), splenium of corpus callosum, and left tapetum in the PACG group, the results are statistically significant (GRF correction, voxel-level P < 0.001, cluster-level P < 0.05). Furthermore, the SVM classification had an accuracy of 80.0% and an area under the curve (AUC) of 0.86 for distinguishing patients with PACG from HC.Conclusion: The findings of our study uncover abnormal WM functional alterations in PACG patients and mainly involves vision-related regions. These findings provide new insights into widespread brain damage in PACG from an alternative WM functional perspective.Keywords: primary angle-closure glaucoma, amplitude of low frequency fluctuations, white matter, support vector machine

Keywords

• primary angle-closure glaucoma
• amplitude of low frequency fluctuations；white matter；support vector machine