Cerebral white matter development in rhesus macaque during the early postnatal phase as measured via diffusion MRI (2016)

Undergraduate: Jeffrey Young

Faculty Advisor: Martin Styner
Department: Biology

---

Diffusion tensor imaging provides a unique way for researchers to capture the microstructure of white matter tracts throughout the brain and examine developmental trajectories. Additionally, the rhesus macaque (Macaca mulatta) is one of the most commonly used nonhuman translational models, and provides a unique opportunity to study normal brain maturation and development, especially in early infancy, where crucial information about formative developmental trajectories is still missing in young children. In this project, we have created a detailed longitudinal diffusion tensor atlas set of the rhesus macaque at age 0 to 36 months from the UNC-Wisconsin Neurodevelopment Rhesus Macaque Database. This project employed scripting with complex diffusion atlas software: to build the subject specific-atlases, to create a longitudinal atlas from each of the subject-specific atlases, to propagate the white matter tracts from a prior atlas, and to extract fiber bundle measurements. This atlas is being publicly disseminated to serve as an invaluable tool for other researchers in the field of neuroimaging.