Year: 2026
Type: article
Abstract: Brain neuronal networks combine dense local processing, sparse long-range projections, heterogeneous synaptic weights, and constantly changing activity, making topology a mechanistic determinant of communication rather than a static description. Against this backdrop, maximumflow and minimum-cut algorithms offer complementary questions: how much information or activity can move between selected populations, and which lowest-capacity edge or node sets constrain that transfer? Applied to connectomic graphs, they can localize bottlenecks, critical connectors, and vulnerable partitions, while extending centrality-based analyses beyond simple hub identification. As evidence accumulated, their value became clearest when efficiency and robustness were considered together. High-capacity routes may support functional integration, yet focal failure of hubs or intermodular connectors can cause disproportionate disruption; conversely, a minimum cut may represent a transient, state-dependent constraint rather than a permanently indispensable structure. Neuromodulatory reconfiguration and task dependence therefore require capacities to be interpreted dynamically. Biological validation further complicates the picture: diffusion tractography varies with processing choices, electron-microscopy reconstructions remain vulnerable to segmentation and coverage errors, and aggregation across scales can either obscure cellular bottlenecks or exaggerate regional ones. Functional connectivity, pathology-linked propagation, dense recordings, and targeted reconstruction provide complementary tests of predicted routes and cuts. Future progress depends on multiscale, temporally resolved graphs with biologically justified capacities and uncertainty-aware optimization, using flow measures alongside modularity, rich-club structure, betweenness, and other network descriptors rather than as universal proxies for neural function.
Authors: Yunhao Xie, Xueyin Ma, Peijia Wu, Yanan Dai
Institutions: Fudan University, Honeywell (United States)
Language: English
Subfield: Cognitive Neuroscience
Field: Neuroscience
Domain: Life Sciences
Open Access status: hybrid
OpenAlex ID: W7213315003