Children born very preterm experience altered cortical expansion over the first decade of life

• DOI: 10.1093/braincomms/fcae318
• Publication Date: 2024-09-17T17:30:36Z
• Authors: Lisa S Gorham; Aidan R Latham; Dimitrios Alexopo...; Jeanette K Kenley; Emily Iannopollo; Rachel E Lean; David Loseille; Tara A Smyser; Jeffrey J Neil; Cynthia E Rogers; Christopher D Smyser; Kara Garcia

The brain develops rapidly from the final trimester of gestation through childhood, with cortical surface area expanding greatly in first decade life. However, it is unclear exactly where and how changes after birth, or prematurity affects these developmental trajectories. Fifty-two very preterm (gestational age at birth = 26 ± 1.6 weeks) 41 full-term 39 1.2 infants were scanned using structural magnetic resonance imaging term-equivalent again 9/10 years age. Individual reconstructions extracted for each scan. Infant surfaces aligned anatomically constrained Multimodal Surface Matching (aMSM), a technique that allows calculation local expansion gradients across individual subject. At neonatal time point, had significantly smaller than their peers (