Tamnes, CK;
Herting, MM;
Goddings, AL;
Meuwese, R;
Blakemore, SJ;
Dahl, RE;
Güroğlu, B;
... Mills, KL; + view all
(2017)
Development of the cerebral cortex across adolescence: A multisample study of interrelated longitudinal changes in cortical volume, surface area and thickness.
Journal of Neuroscience
, 37
(12)
pp. 3402-3412.
10.1523/JNEUROSCI.3302-16.2017.
Preview |
Text
Bracey_Blakemore_JNEUROSCI.3302-16.2017.full.pdf - Published Version Download (4MB) | Preview |
Abstract
Accurate understanding of typical human brain development and how changes in different structural components relate to each other is critical before we can assess and interpret how they relate to cognition, affect and motivation, and how these processes are perturbed in clinical or at-risk populations. We conducted a multisample magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) study to investigate the development of cortical volume, surface area and thickness, as well as their interrelationships, from late childhood to early adulthood (7-29 years) using four separate longitudinal samples including 388 participants and 854 scans in total. These independent datasets were processed and quality-controlled using the same methods, but analyzed separately to study the replicability of the results across sample and image acquisition characteristics. The results consistently showed widespread and regionally variable non-linear decreases in cortical volume and thickness and comparably smaller steady decreases in surface area. Further, the dominant contributor to cortical volume reductions during adolescence was thinning. Finally, complex regional and topological patterns of associations between changes in surface area and thickness were observed. Positive relationships were seen in sulcal regions in prefrontal and temporal cortices, while negative relationships were seen mainly in gyral regions in more posterior cortices. Collectively, these results help to resolve previous inconsistencies regarding the structural development of the cerebral cortex from childhood to adulthood, and provide novel insight into how changes in the different dimensions of the cortex in this period of life are interrelated.Significance StatementDifferent measures of brain anatomy develop differently across adolescence. Their precise trajectories and how they relate to each other throughout development is not established, but important for our understanding of both typical development, as well as disorders involving aberrant brain development. To provide accurate characterizations of how different measures of cortical structure develop, we performed an MRI investigation across four independent datasets. The most profound anatomical change in the cortex during adolescence was thinning, with largest decreases observed in the parietal lobe. There were complex regional patterns of associations between changes in surface area and thickness, with positive relationships seen in sulcal regions in prefrontal and temporal cortices, and negative relationships seen mainly in gyral regions in more posterior cortices.
Archive Staff Only
 |
View Item |
