Community driven dynamics of oscillatory network responses to threat

Physiological responses to threat stimuli involve neural synchronized oscillations in cerebral networks with distinct organization properties. Community architecture within these networks and its dynamic adaptation could play a critical role in achieving optimal physiological responses. Here we applied dynamic network analyses to address the early phases of threat processing at the millisecond level, describing multi-frequency (theta and alpha) integration and basic reorganization properties (flexibility and clustering) that drive physiological responses. We quantified cortical and subcortical network interactions and captured illustrative reconfigurations using community allegiance as essential fingerprints of large-scale adaptation. A theta band driven community reorganization of key anatomical regions forming the threat network (TN) along with transitions of nodes from the dorsal attention (DAN) and salience (SN) circuits predict the optimal physiological response to threat. We show that increase flexibility of the community network architecture drives the physiological responses during instructed threat processing. Nodal switches modulate the directionality of information flows in the involved circuits. These results provide a captivating perspective of flexible network responses to threat and shed new light on basic physiological principles relevant for the development of stress- and threat-related mental disorders.