The Developmental Trajectories of Schoolchildren's Brain Functional Specialization and its Significance to Cognitive Performance — Taking Verbal Intelligence as an Example

[Remi-Gau]

Added as an issue for book keeping

Source:
https://brainhack.live/

Leader:
Li-Zhen Chen

Details

Functional homotopy, the high degree of synchrony in spontaneous activity between geometrically corresponding interhemispheric regions, is a fundamental characteristic of the intrinsic functional architecture of the brain. An opposite concept is “functional specialization”. Brain functional specialization emphasizes hemispheric processing, which allows the expanded human brain to minimize between-hemisphere connectivity and distribute domain-specific processing functions. The improvement in functional specialization between hemispheres may enhance the efficiency of cognitive processing. Through the evaluation of functional specialization, the specific cognitive ability can be predicted to some extent. Generally, schoolchildren are a group which is highly concerned by the society. However, rare studies have been conducted to directly examine the development of functional homotopy or functional specialization and their relationship with cognitive performance in this group. Describing the development trajectory of functional specialization in healthy schoolchildren is helpful to identify children with cognitive developmental defects. Although it is well-established that human language functions are mostly lateralized to the left hemisphere of the brain, little is known about the development of such functional specialization. Voxel-mirrored homotopic connectivity (VMHC), a method that quantifies the resting-state FC between each voxel in one hemisphere and its corresponding voxel in the opposite hemisphere, can be used to evaluate the functional specialization between the two hemispheres. In this project, we aim to depict the developmental trajectories of functional specialization in schoolchildren. At the same time, the functional specialization development in verbal related areas and its relationship with verbal intelligence will be evaluated. Through the project, you will gain a basic understanding of the development pattern of functional connectivity between hemispheres and how they can be related to cognitive development, as well as the use of Generalized Additive Mixed Models in longitudinal studies.

• Programming languages:
  Matlab, R

• A list of requirements for taking part in the project (education level / English level /all the informat on you consider important for participants)

1. BSc program, or higher 2. English: good 3. Programming languages / other competences: MATLAB/R/FreeSurfer

What participants gain/learn from this project

1. Basic understanding of experimental approaches in neuroscience 2. Hands on session with data analysis 3. Testing their own hypothesis 4. Knowledge about the functional specialization development

A list of 1-5 key papers / online materials summarising the subject:

1. Zuo, X. N., Kelly, C., Di Martino, A., Mennes, M., Margulies, D. S., Bangaru, S., . . . Milham, M. P. (2010). Growing together and growing apart: regional and sex differences in the lifespan developmental trajectories of functional homotopy. J Neurosci, 30(45), 15034-15043.
2. Wang, S., Van der Haegen, L., Tao, L., & Cai, Q. (2019). Brain Functional Organization Associated With Language Lateralization. Cereb Cortex, 29(10), 4312-4320.
3. van Duijvenvoorde, A. C. K., Westhoff, B., de Vos, F., Wierenga, L. M., & Crone, E. A. (2019). A three-wave longitudinal study of subcortical-cortical resting-state connectivity in adolescence: Testing age- and puberty-related changes. Hum Brain Mapp, 40(13), 3769-3783.
4. Dong, H.-M., Castellanos, F. X., Yang, N., Zhang, Z., Zhou, Q., He, Y., . . . Zuo, X.-N. (2020). Charting brain growth in tandem with brain templates at school age. Science Bulletin, 65(22), 1924-1934.

• Preferred maximal number of participants:
  4

• How many non-programming participants can join you during your project, what profession can they be?
  1