Estimating the impact of structural directionality: How reliable are undirected connectomes?

TL;DR

This study evaluates how ignoring connection directionality in brain networks affects the accuracy of network measures, revealing that the omission can significantly distort hub identification and network topology, especially when reciprocal connections are added.

Contribution

It systematically compares methods of converting directed brain networks into undirected ones and quantifies the resulting inaccuracies in network analysis.

Findings

Adding reciprocal connections causes larger errors than removing connections.

Core-periphery structure remains accurate despite ignoring directionality.

Hub nodes are significantly affected by the lack of directionality.

Abstract

Directionality is a fundamental feature of network connections. Most structural brain networks are intrinsically directed because of the nature of chemical synapses, which comprise most neuronal connections. Due to limitations of non-invasive imaging techniques, the directionality of connections between structurally connected regions of the human brain cannot be confirmed. Hence, connections are represented as undirected, and it is still unknown how this lack of directionality affects brain network topology. Using six directed brain networks from different species and parcellations (cat, mouse, C. elegans, and three macaque networks), we estimate the inaccuracies in network measures (degree, betweenness, clustering coefficient, path length, global efficiency, participation index, and small worldness) associated with the removal of the directionality of connections. We employ three different methods to render directed brain networks undirected: (i) remove uni-directional connections, (ii) add reciprocal connections, and (iii) combine equal numbers of removed and added uni-directional connections. We quantify the extent of inaccuracy in network measures introduced through neglecting connection directionality for individual nodes and across the network. We find that the coarse division between core and peripheral nodes remains accurate for undirected networks. However, hub nodes differ considerably when directionality is neglected. Comparing the different methods to generate undirected networks from directed ones, we generally find that the addition of reciprocal connections (false positives) causes larger errors in graph-theoretic measures than the removal of the same number of directed connections (false negatives). These findings suggest that directionality plays an essential role in shaping brain networks and highlight some limitations of undirected connectomes.