Abstract
In order to evaluate brain changes in young children with Pierre Robin sequence (PRs) using machine learning based on apparent diffusion coefficient (ADC) features, we retrospectively enrolled a total of 60 cases (42 in the training dataset and 18 in the testing dataset) which included 30 PRs and 30 controls from the Children's Hospital Affiliated to the Nanjing Medical University from January 2017-December 2019. There were 21 and nine PRs cases in each dataset, with the remainder belonging to the control group in the same age range. A total of 105 ADC features were extracted from magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) data. Features were pruned using least absolute shrinkage and selection operator (LASSO) regression and seven ADC features were developed as the optimal signatures for training machine learning models. Support vector machine (SVM) achieved an area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUC) of 0.99 for the training set and 0.85 for the testing set. The AUC of the multivariable logistic regression (MLR) and the AdaBoost for the training and validation dataset were 0.98/0.84 and 0.94/0.69, respectively. Based on the ADC features, the two groups of cases (i.e., the PRs group and the control group) could be well-distinguished by the machine learning models, indicating that there is a significant difference in brain development between children with PRs and normal controls.