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Padula MC, Schaer M, Scariati E, Mutlu AK, Zöller D, Schneider M, Eliez S. Quantifying indices of short- and long-range white matter connectivity at each cortical vertex. PLoS One 2017; 12:e0187493. [PMID: 29141024 PMCID: PMC5687731 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0187493] [Citation(s) in RCA: 5] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/31/2017] [Accepted: 10/20/2017] [Indexed: 01/27/2023] Open
Abstract
Several neurodevelopmental diseases are characterized by impairments in cortical morphology along with altered white matter connectivity. However, the relationship between these two measures is not yet clear. In this study, we propose a novel methodology to compute and display metrics of white matter connectivity at each cortical point. After co-registering the extremities of the tractography streamlines with the cortical surface, we computed two measures of connectivity at each cortical vertex: the mean tracts’ length, and the proportion of short- and long-range connections. The proposed measures were tested in a clinical sample of 62 patients with 22q11.2 deletion syndrome (22q11DS) and 57 typically developing individuals. Using these novel measures, we achieved a fine-grained visualization of the white matter connectivity patterns at each vertex of the cortical surface. We observed an intriguing pattern of both increased and decreased short- and long-range connectivity in 22q11DS, that provides novel information about the nature and topology of white matter alterations in the syndrome. We argue that the method presented in this study opens avenues for additional analyses of the relationship between cortical properties and patterns of underlying structural connectivity, which will help clarifying the intrinsic mechanisms that lead to altered brain structure in neurodevelopmental disorders.
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Affiliation(s)
- Maria Carmela Padula
- Developmental Imaging and Psychopathology Laboratory, University of Geneva School of medicine, Geneva, Switzerland
- * E-mail:
| | - Marie Schaer
- Developmental Imaging and Psychopathology Laboratory, University of Geneva School of medicine, Geneva, Switzerland
| | - Elisa Scariati
- Developmental Imaging and Psychopathology Laboratory, University of Geneva School of medicine, Geneva, Switzerland
| | - A. Kadir Mutlu
- Neuro-Electronics Research Flanders, Leuven, The Netherlands
| | - Daniela Zöller
- Developmental Imaging and Psychopathology Laboratory, University of Geneva School of medicine, Geneva, Switzerland
- Medical Image Processing Laboratory, Institute of Bioengineering, Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale Lausanne (EPFL), Lausanne, Switzerland
| | - Maude Schneider
- Developmental Imaging and Psychopathology Laboratory, University of Geneva School of medicine, Geneva, Switzerland
| | - Stephan Eliez
- Developmental Imaging and Psychopathology Laboratory, University of Geneva School of medicine, Geneva, Switzerland
- Department of Genetic Medicine and Development, University of Geneva School of medicine, Geneva, Switzerland
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2
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Ouyang M, Kang H, Detre JA, Roberts TPL, Huang H. Short-range connections in the developmental connectome during typical and atypical brain maturation. Neurosci Biobehav Rev 2017; 83:109-122. [PMID: 29024679 DOI: 10.1016/j.neubiorev.2017.10.007] [Citation(s) in RCA: 61] [Impact Index Per Article: 8.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/20/2017] [Revised: 09/09/2017] [Accepted: 10/06/2017] [Indexed: 01/10/2023]
Abstract
The human brain is remarkably complex with connectivity constituting its basic organizing principle. Although long-range connectivity has been focused on in most research, short-range connectivity is characterized by unique and spatiotemporally heterogeneous dynamics from infancy to adulthood. Alterations in the maturational dynamics of short-range connectivity has been associated with neuropsychiatric disorders, such as autism and schizophrenia. Recent advances in neuroimaging techniques, especially diffusion magnetic resonance imaging (dMRI), resting-state functional MRI (rs-fMRI), electroencephalography (EEG) and magnetoencephalography (MEG), have made quantification of short-range connectivity possible in pediatric populations. This review summarizes findings on the development of short-range functional and structural connections at the macroscale. These findings suggest an inverted U-shaped pattern of maturation from primary to higher-order brain regions, and possible "hyper-" and "hypo-" short-range connections in autism and schizophrenia, respectively. The precisely balanced short- and long-range connections contribute to the integration and segregation of the connectome during development. The mechanistic relationship among short-range connectivity maturation, the developmental connectome and emerging brain functions needs further investigation, including the refinement of methodological approaches.
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Affiliation(s)
- Minhui Ouyang
- Radiology Research, Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, PA, United States
| | - Huiying Kang
- Radiology Research, Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, PA, United States; Department of Radiology, Beijing Children's Hospital, Capital Medical University, Beijing, China
| | - John A Detre
- Department of Neurology, Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania, PA, United States; Department of Radiology, Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania, PA, United States
| | - Timothy P L Roberts
- Radiology Research, Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, PA, United States; Department of Radiology, Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania, PA, United States
| | - Hao Huang
- Radiology Research, Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, PA, United States; Department of Radiology, Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania, PA, United States.
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Feng L, Jeon T, Yu Q, Ouyang M, Peng Q, Mishra V, Pletikos M, Sestan N, Miller MI, Mori S, Hsiao S, Liu S, Huang H. Population-averaged macaque brain atlas with high-resolution ex vivo DTI integrated into in vivo space. Brain Struct Funct 2017. [PMID: 28634624 DOI: 10.1007/s00429-017-1463-6] [Citation(s) in RCA: 27] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.9] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 12/31/2022]
Abstract
Animal models of the rhesus macaque (Macaca mulatta), the most widely used nonhuman primate, have been irreplaceable in neurobiological studies. However, a population-averaged macaque brain diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) atlas, including comprehensive gray and white matter labeling as well as bony and facial landmarks guiding invasive experimental procedures, is not available. The macaque white matter tract pathways and microstructures have been rarely recorded. Here, we established a population-averaged macaque brain atlas with high-resolution ex vivo DTI integrated into in vivo space incorporating bony and facial landmarks, and delineated microstructures and three-dimensional pathways of major white matter tracts in vivo MRI/DTI and ex vivo (postmortem) DTI of ten rhesus macaque brains were acquired. Single-subject macaque brain DTI template was obtained by transforming the postmortem high-resolution DTI data into in vivo space. Ex vivo DTI of ten macaque brains was then averaged in the in vivo single-subject template space to generate population-averaged macaque brain DTI atlas. The white matter tracts were traced with DTI-based tractography. One hundred and eighteen neural structures including all cortical gyri, white matter tracts and subcortical nuclei, were labeled manually on population-averaged DTI-derived maps. The in vivo microstructural metrics of fractional anisotropy, axial, radial and mean diffusivity of the traced white matter tracts were measured. Population-averaged digital atlas integrated into in vivo space can be used to label the experimental macaque brain automatically. Bony and facial landmarks will be available for guiding invasive procedures. The DTI metric measurements offer unique insights into heterogeneous microstructural profiles of different white matter tracts.
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Affiliation(s)
- Lei Feng
- Research Center for Sectional and Imaging Anatomy, Shandong University School of Medicine, Jinan, China.,Radiology Research, Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, 3401 Civic Center Blvd, Philadelphia, PA, 19104, USA
| | - Tina Jeon
- Radiology Research, Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, 3401 Civic Center Blvd, Philadelphia, PA, 19104, USA.,Advanced Imaging Research Center, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, TX, USA
| | - Qiaowen Yu
- Research Center for Sectional and Imaging Anatomy, Shandong University School of Medicine, Jinan, China.,Advanced Imaging Research Center, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, TX, USA
| | - Minhui Ouyang
- Radiology Research, Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, 3401 Civic Center Blvd, Philadelphia, PA, 19104, USA.,Advanced Imaging Research Center, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, TX, USA
| | - Qinmu Peng
- Radiology Research, Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, 3401 Civic Center Blvd, Philadelphia, PA, 19104, USA
| | - Virendra Mishra
- Advanced Imaging Research Center, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, TX, USA
| | - Mihovil Pletikos
- Department of Neuroscience and Kavli Institute for Neuroscience, Yale School of Medicine, New Haven, CT 06510, USA
| | - Nenad Sestan
- Department of Neuroscience and Kavli Institute for Neuroscience, Yale School of Medicine, New Haven, CT 06510, USA
| | - Michael I Miller
- Center for Imaging Science, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD, USA
| | - Susumu Mori
- Department of Radiology, School of Medicine, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD, USA.,F.M. Kirby Research Center for Functional Brain Imaging, Kennedy Krieger Institute, Baltimore, MD, USA
| | - Steven Hsiao
- Mind/Brain Institute, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD, USA
| | - Shuwei Liu
- Research Center for Sectional and Imaging Anatomy, Shandong University School of Medicine, Jinan, China
| | - Hao Huang
- Radiology Research, Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, 3401 Civic Center Blvd, Philadelphia, PA, 19104, USA. .,Advanced Imaging Research Center, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, TX, USA. .,Department of Radiology, Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA 19104, USA.
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Jeon T, Mishra V, Ouyang M, Chen M, Huang H. Synchronous Changes of Cortical Thickness and Corresponding White Matter Microstructure During Brain Development Accessed by Diffusion MRI Tractography from Parcellated Cortex. Front Neuroanat 2015; 9:158. [PMID: 26696839 PMCID: PMC4667005 DOI: 10.3389/fnana.2015.00158] [Citation(s) in RCA: 23] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/29/2015] [Accepted: 11/18/2015] [Indexed: 12/30/2022] Open
Abstract
Cortical thickness (CT) changes during normal brain development is associated with complicated cellular and molecular processes including synaptic pruning and apoptosis. In parallel, the microstructural enhancement of developmental white matter (WM) axons with their neuronal bodies in the cerebral cortex has been widely reported with measurements of metrics derived from diffusion tensor imaging (DTI), especially fractional anisotropy (FA). We hypothesized that the changes of CT and microstructural enhancement of corresponding axons are highly interacted during development. DTI and T1-weighted images of 50 healthy children and adolescents between the ages of 7 and 25 years were acquired. With the parcellated cortical gyri transformed from T1-weighted images to DTI space as the tractography seeds, probabilistic tracking was performed to delineate the WM fibers traced from specific parcellated cortical regions. CT was measured at certain cortical regions and FA was measured from the WM fibers traced from same cortical regions. The CT of all frontal cortical gyri, including Brodmann areas 4, 6, 8, 9, 10, 11, 44, 45, 46, and 47, decreased significantly and heterogeneously; concurrently, significant, and heterogeneous increases of FA of WM traced from corresponding regions were found. We further revealed significant correlation between the slopes of the CT decrease and the slopes of corresponding WM FA increase in all frontal cortical gyri, suggesting coherent cortical pruning and corresponding WM microstructural enhancement. Such correlation was not found in cortical regions other than frontal cortex. The molecular and cellular mechanisms of these synchronous changes may be associated with overlapping signaling pathways of axonal guidance, synaptic pruning, neuronal apoptosis, and more prevalent interstitial neurons in the prefrontal cortex. Revealing the coherence of cortical and WM structural changes during development may open a new window for understanding the underlying mechanisms of developing brain circuits and structural abnormality associated with mental disorders.
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Affiliation(s)
- Tina Jeon
- Radiology Research, Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, Philadelphia PA, USA ; Advanced Imaging Research Center, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas, Dallas TX, USA
| | - Virendra Mishra
- Advanced Imaging Research Center, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas, Dallas TX, USA ; Lou Ruvo Center for Brain Health, Cleveland Clinic, Las Vegas NV, USA
| | - Minhui Ouyang
- Radiology Research, Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, Philadelphia PA, USA ; Advanced Imaging Research Center, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas, Dallas TX, USA
| | - Min Chen
- Department of Mathematical Sciences, University of Texas at Dallas, Richardson TX, USA
| | - Hao Huang
- Radiology Research, Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, Philadelphia PA, USA ; Department of Radiology, Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia PA, USA
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5
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Jeon T, Mishra V, Uh J, Weiner M, Hatanpaa KJ, White CL, Zhao YD, Lu H, Diaz-Arrastia R, Huang H. Regional changes of cortical mean diffusivities with aging after correction of partial volume effects. Neuroimage 2012; 62:1705-16. [PMID: 22683383 PMCID: PMC3574164 DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2012.05.082] [Citation(s) in RCA: 20] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/09/2012] [Revised: 04/05/2012] [Accepted: 05/29/2012] [Indexed: 10/28/2022] Open
Abstract
Accurately measuring the cortical mean diffusivity (MD) derived from diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) at the comprehensive lobe, gyral and voxel level of young, elderly healthy brains and those with Alzheimer's disease (AD) may provide insights on heterogeneous cortical microstructural changes caused by aging and AD. Due to partial volume effects (PVE), the measurement of cortical MD is overestimated with contamination of cerebrospinal fluid (CSF). The bias is especially severe for aging and AD brains because of significant cortical thinning of these brains. In this study, we aimed to quantitatively characterize the unbiased regional cortical MD changes due to aging and AD and delineate the effects of cortical thinning of elderly healthy and AD groups on MD measurements. DTI and T1-weighted images of 14 young, 15 elderly healthy subjects and 17 AD patients were acquired. With the parcellated cortical gyri and lobes from T1 weighted image transformed to DTI, regional cortical MD of all subjects before and after PVE correction were measured. CSF contamination model was used to correct bias of MD caused by PVE. Compared to cortical MD of young group, significant increases of corrected MD for elderly healthy and AD groups were found only in frontal and limbic regions, respectively, while there were significant increases of uncorrected MD all over the cortex. Uncorrected MD are significantly higher in limbic and temporal gyri in AD group, compared to those in elderly healthy group but higher MD only remained in limbic gyri after PVE correction. Cortical thickness was also measured for all groups. The correlation slopes between cortical MD and thickness for elderly healthy and AD groups were significantly decreased after PVE correction compared to before correction while no significant change of correlation slope was detected for young group. It suggests that the cortical thinning in elderly healthy and AD groups is a significant contributor to the bias of uncorrected cortical MD measurement. The established comprehensive unbiased cortical MD profiles of young, elderly healthy subjects and AD patients at the lobe, gyral and voxel level may serve as clinical references for cortical microstructure.
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Affiliation(s)
- Tina Jeon
- Advanced Imaging Research Center, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, USA
| | - Virendra Mishra
- Advanced Imaging Research Center, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, USA
| | - Jinsoo Uh
- Advanced Imaging Research Center, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, USA
| | - Myron Weiner
- Department of Psychiatry, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, USA
- Department of Neurology, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, USA
| | - Kimmo J. Hatanpaa
- Department of Pathology, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, USA
| | - Charles L. White
- Department of Pathology, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, USA
| | - Yan D. Zhao
- Department of Clinical Sciences, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, USA
| | - Hanzhang Lu
- Advanced Imaging Research Center, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, USA
- Department of Radiology, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, USA
| | - Ramon Diaz-Arrastia
- Department of Psychiatry, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, USA
- Department of Neurology, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, USA
| | - Hao Huang
- Advanced Imaging Research Center, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, USA
- Department of Radiology, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, USA
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