Intrinsic activity development unfolds along a sensorimotor–association cortical axis in youth

Nature Neuroscience · 2023 · 185 citations

• Neuroscience
• Psychology
• Biology

Neurodevelopment of the association cortices: Patterns, mechanisms, and implications for psychopathology

Neuron · 2021 · 733 citations

• Neuroscience
• Psychology
• Biology

Environmental influences on the pace of brain development

Nature reviews. Neuroscience · 2021 · 494 citations

• Computer Science
• Psychology
• Developmental psychology

Childhood socio-economic status (SES), a measure of the availability of material and social resources, is one of the strongest predictors of lifelong well-being. Here we review evidence that experiences associated with childhood SES affect not only the outcome but also the pace of brain development. We argue that higher childhood SES is associated with protracted structural brain development and a prolonged trajectory of functional network segregation, ultimately leading to more efficient cortical networks in adulthood. We hypothesize that greater exposure to chronic stress accelerates brain maturation, whereas greater access to novel positive experiences decelerates maturation. We discuss the impact of variation in the pace of brain development on plasticity and learning. We provide a generative theoretical framework to catalyse future basic science and translational research on environmental influences on brain development.

QSIPrep: an integrative platform for preprocessing and reconstructing diffusion MRI data

Nature Methods · 2021 · 315 citations

• Computer Science
• Computer Science
• Data Mining

QSIPrep: An integrative platform for preprocessing and reconstructing diffusion MRI

bioRxiv (Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory) · 2020 · 25 citations

• Computer Science
• Computer Science
• Artificial Intelligence

ABSTRACT Diffusion-weighted magnetic resonance imaging (dMRI) has become the primary method for non-invasively studying the organization of white matter in the human brain. While many dMRI acquisition sequences have been developed, they all sample q-space in order to characterize water diffusion. Numerous software platforms have been developed for processing dMRI data, but most work on only a subset of sampling schemes or implement only parts of the processing workflow. Reproducible research and comparisons across dMRI methods are hindered by incompatible software, diverse file formats, and inconsistent naming conventions. Here we introduce QSIPrep, an integrative software platform for the processing of diffusion images that is compatible with nearly all dMRI sampling schemes. Drawing upon a diverse set of software suites to capitalize upon their complementary strengths, QSIPrep automatically applies best practices for dMRI preprocessing, including denoising, distortion correction, head motion correction, coregistration, and spatial normalization. Throughout, QSIPrep provides both visual and quantitative measures of data quality as well as “glass-box” methods reporting. Taken together, these features facilitate easy implementation of best practices for processing of diffusion images while simultaneously ensuring reproducibility.