Learning Structural-Functional Brain Representations through Multi-Scale Adaptive Graph Attention for Cognitive Insight

Understanding how brain structure and function interact is key to explaining intelligence yet modeling them jointly is challenging as the structural and functional connectome capture complementary aspects of organization. We introduced Multi-scale Adaptive Graph Network (MAGNet), a Transformer-style graph neural network framework that adaptively learns structure-function interactions. MAGNet leverages source-based morphometry from structural MRI to extract inter-regional morphological features and fuses them with functional network connectivity from resting-state fMRI. A hybrid graph integrates direct and indirect pathways, while local-global attention refines connectivity importance and a joint loss simultaneously enforces cross-modal coherence and optimizes the prediction objective end-to-end. On the ABCD dataset, MAGNet outperformed relevant baselines, demonstrating effective multimodal integration for advancing our understanding of cognitive function.

NeuroBRIDGE: Behavior-Conditioned Koopman Dynamics with Riemannian Alignment for Early Substance Use Initiation Prediction from Longitudinal Functional Connectome

Early identification of adolescents at risk for substance use initiation (SUI) is vital yet difficult, as most predictors treat connectivity as static or cross-sectional and miss how brain networks change over time and with behavior. We proposed NeuroBRIDGE (Behavior conditioned RIemannian Koopman Dynamics on lonGitudinal connEctomes), a novel graph neural network-based framework that aligns longitudinal functional connectome in a Riemannian tangent space and couples dual-time attention with behavioral-conditioned Koopman dynamics to capture temporal change. Evaluated on ABCD, NeuroBRIDGE improved future SUI prediction over relevant baselines while offering interpretable insights into neural pathways, refining our understanding of neurodevelopmental risk and informing targeted prevention.

KOCOBrain: Kuramoto-Guided Graph Network for Uncovering Structure-Function Coupling in Adolescent Prenatal Drug Exposure

Exposure to psychoactive substances during pregnancy, such as cannabis, can disrupt neurodevelopment and alter large-scale brain networks, yet identifying their neural signatures remains challenging. We introduced KOCOBrain: KuramotO COupled Brain Graph Network; a unified graph neural network framework that integrates structural and functional connectomes via Kuramoto-based phase dynamics and cognition-aware attention. The Kuramoto layer models neural synchronization over anatomical connections, generating phase-informed embeddings that capture structure-function coupling, while cognitive scores modulate information routing in a subject-specific manner followed by a joint objective enhancing robustness under class imbalance scenario. Applied to the ABCD cohort, KOCOBrain improved prenatal drug exposure prediction over relevant baselines and revealed interpretable structure-function patterns that reflect disrupted brain network coordination associated with early exposure.