Integrated structural and functional atlases of Asian children from infancy to childhood
Jingwen Zhu1, Han Zhang1, Yap-Seng Chong2
1Department of Biomedical Engineering, National University of Singapore, 4 Engineering Drive 3, Block E4 #04-08, 11758, Singapore.
Insights
This study created novel brain atlases for infants and children, integrating structural and functional data. These atlases reveal stable early brain networks and dynamic higher-order network development during childhood.
Area of Science:
- Neuroscience
- Developmental Biology
- Medical Imaging
Background:
- The developing brain undergoes rapid growth in early life.
- Age-appropriate brain atlases are crucial for understanding neurodevelopmental trajectories.
- Existing atlases often lack integrated structural and functional data across pediatric age groups.
Purpose of the Study:
- To construct multi-modal structural and functional brain atlases for infants and children.
- To characterize brain anatomical and functional development from infancy to childhood.
- To provide a resource for studying coherent patterns of brain development.
Main Methods:
- Utilized large deformation diffeomorphic metric mapping and probabilistic atlas generation.
- Integrated structural MRI and diffusion-weighted imaging (DWIs) for white matter tract analysis.
- Employed spectral clustering on resting-state fMRI (rs-fMRI) data for functional network parcellation.
Main Results:
- Generated integrated structural and functional brain atlases for 6-month-old infants, and 4.5-, 6-, and 7.5-year-old children.
- Characterized cortical folding geometry, subcortical regions, white matter tracts, and functional networks in a stereotaxic space.
- Observed stable primary cortical networks from infancy and dynamic development in higher-order networks.
Conclusions:
- The developed atlases provide a comprehensive characterization of brain development.
- Multi-modal fusion analysis highlights coherent anatomical and functional integration during childhood.
- These atlases serve as a valuable tool for investigating pediatric neurodevelopment.
Abstract:
The developing brain grows exponentially in the first few years of life. There is a need to have age-appropriate brain atlases that coherently characterize the geometry of the cerebral cortex, white matter tracts, and functional organization. This study employed multi-modal brain images of an Asian cohort and constructed brain structural and functional atlases for 6-month-old infants, 4.5-, 6-, and 7.5-year-old children. We exploited large deformation diffeomorphic metric mapping and probabilistic atlas generation approaches to integrate structural MRI and diffusion weighted images (DWIs) and to create the atlas where white matter tracts well fit into the cortical folding pattern. Based on this structural atlas, we then employed spectral clustering to parcellate the brain into functional networks from resting-state fMRI (rs-fMRI). Our results provided the atlas that characterizes the cortical folding geometry, subcortical regions, deep white matter tracts, as well as functional networks in a stereotaxic coordinate space for the four different age groups. The functional networks consisting of the primary cortex were well established in infancy and remained stable to childhood, while specific higher-order functional networks showed specific patterns of hemispherical, subcortical-cerebellar, and cortical-cortical integration and segregation from infancy to childhood. Our multi-modal fusion analysis demonstrated the use of the integrated structural and functional atlas for understanding coherent patterns of brain anatomical and functional development during childhood. Hence, our atlases can be potentially used to study coherent patterns of brain anatomical and functional development.
