Journal Article

Investigating grey matter volumetric trajectories through the lifespan at the individual level

Whelan, Robert, Nees, Frauke, Martinot, Jean-Luc, Hohmann, Sarah, Smolka, Michael N., Garavan, Hugh, Heinz, Andreas, Flor, Herta, Artiges, Eric, Banaschewski, Tobias, Orfanos, Dimitri Papadopoulos, Xiang, Shitong, Jia, Tianye, Desrivières, Sylvane, Martinot, Marie-Laure Paillère, Kang, Jujiao, Bokde, Arun L. W., Millenet, Sabina, Gowland, Penny, Robbins, Trevor W., Poustka, Luise, Barker, Gareth J., Brühl, Rüdiger, Schumann, Gunter, Vaidya, Nilakshi, Shi, Runye, Lin, Xiaolei, Walter, Henrik, Paus, Tomáš, Feng, Jianfeng, Grigis, Antoine, Fröhner, Juliane H., Sahakian, Barbara J.

2024

Overview

Adolescents exhibit remarkable heterogeneity in the structural architecture of brain development. However, due to limited large-scale longitudinal neuroimaging studies, existing research has largely focused on population averages, and the neurobiological basis underlying individual heterogeneity remains poorly understood. Here we identify, using the IMAGEN adolescent cohort followed up over 9 years (14–23 y), three groups of adolescents characterized by distinct developmental patterns of whole-brain gray matter volume (GMV). Group 1 show continuously decreasing GMV associated with higher neurocognitive performances than the other two groups during adolescence. Group 2 exhibit a slower rate of GMV decrease and lower neurocognitive performances compared with Group 1, which was associated with epigenetic differences and greater environmental burden. Group 3 show increasing GMV and lower baseline neurocognitive performances due to a genetic variation. Using the UK Biobank, we show these differences may be attenuated in mid-to-late adulthood. Our study reveals clusters of adolescent neurodevelopment based on GMV and the potential long-term impact. Longitudinal analysis of neuroimaging data are useful for analysing heterogeneity in adolescent brain development. Here the authors cluster adolescent participants of the IMAGEN study into groups based on gray matter volume developmental patterns and investigate genome-wide and epigenome-wide associations with these groups.

• Publisher: Nature Publishing Group UK,Nature Publishing Group,Nature Portfolio
• Subject: 45/43 / 59/57 / 631/378/116 / 631/378/2571 / Adolescent / Adolescents / Adult / Brain / Brain - diagnostic imaging / Brain - growth & development / Brain architecture / Cluster analysis / Cognition / Cognition - physiology / Epigenetics / Female / Genetic diversity / Genomic analysis / Gray Matter - diagnostic imaging / Group dynamics / Heterogeneity / Humanities and Social Sciences / Humans / Image processing / Impact analysis / Life Sciences / Life span / Longevity / Longitudinal Studies / Magnetic Resonance Imaging / Male / Medical imaging / Middle Aged / multidisciplinary / Neuroimaging / Organ Size / Population studies / Science / Science (multidisciplinary) / Substantia grisea / Teenagers / United Kingdom / Young Adult