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Weak functional connectivity in the human fetal brain prior to preterm birth

Moriah E. Thomason, Dustin Scheinost, Janessa H. Manning, Lauren E. Grove, Jasmine Hect, Narcis Marshall, Edgar Hernandez-Andrade, Susan Berman, Athina Pappas, Lami Yeo, Sonia S. Hassan, R. Todd Constable, Laura R. Ment & Roberto Romero

Scientific Reports 7, Article number: 39286 (2017)


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Disease model Neural patterning

Received: 08 June 2016 Accepted: 21 November 2016 Published online: 09 January 2017

Figure 1: Comparison of preterm (PT) - and term (T) -born fetuses using voxel-level connectivity.

Abstract

It has been suggested that neurological problems more frequent in those born preterm are expressed prior to birth, but owing to technical limitations, this has been difficult to test in humans. We applied novel fetal resting-state functional MRI to measure brain function in 32 human fetuses in utero and found that systems-level neural functional connectivity was diminished in fetuses that would subsequently be born preterm. Neural connectivity was reduced in a left-hemisphere pre-language region, and the degree to which connectivity of this left language region extended to right-hemisphere homologs was positively associated with the time elapsed between fMRI assessment and delivery. These results provide the first evidence that altered functional connectivity in the preterm brain is identifiable before birth. They suggest that neurodevelopmental disorders associated with preterm birth may result from neurological insults that begin in utero.

Additional Information

How to cite this article: Thomason, M. E. et al. Weak functional connectivity in the human fetal brain prior to preterm birth. Sci. Rep. 7, 39286; doi: 10.1038/srep39286 (2017).

Publisher's note: Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

Acknowledgements

This project was supported by awards to M.E.T. from the National Institutes of Health, MH110793 and ES026022, and by a NARSAD Young Investigator Award. This project was also supported in part by NIH contract HHSN 275201300006 C. The authors thank Pavan Jella, Saige Rutherford, Sophia Neuenfeldt, and Ki-Jana Malone for their assistance in acquiring the scan data; Farrah Elrahal, Jamie Pierce, Jordan Boeve, Gillian Grace Spitzley, Sydney Rooks, and Joi Webb for their assistance in participant recruitment, screening, and conducting behavioral testing; and Tarek Bazzi, Alison Li, Kassem Soufan, and Baldish Oberoi for their help with data processing. The authors also thank participant families who generously shared their time.

Author information

Affiliations

Merrill Palmer Skillman Institute for Child and Family Development, Wayne State University, Detroit, MI 48202, USA

Moriah E. Thomason, Janessa H. Manning, Lauren E. Grove, Jasmine Hect & Narcis Marshall

Department of Pediatrics, Wayne State University School of Medicine, Detroit, MI 48202, USA

Moriah E. Thomason & Athina Pappas

Perinatology Research Branch, NICHD/NIH/DHHS, Detroit, Michigan, and Bethesda, Maryland, USA

Moriah E. Thomason, Janessa H. Manning, Lauren E. Grove, Narcis Marshall, Edgar Hernandez-Andrade, Athina Pappas, Lami Yeo, Sonia S. Hassan & Roberto Romero

Institute for Social Research, Survey Research Center, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, 48104, USA

Moriah E. Thomason

Department of Radiology & Biomedical Imaging, Yale School of Medicine, New Haven, CT 06520, USA

Dustin Scheinost & R. Todd Constable

Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Wayne State University School of Medicine, Detroit, MI 48202, USA

Edgar Hernandez-Andrade, Susan Berman, Lami Yeo & Sonia S. Hassan

Department of Neurosurgery, Yale School of Medicine, New Haven, CT 06520, USA

R. Todd Constable

Department of Pediatrics, Yale School of Medicine, New Haven, CT 06520, USA

Laura R. Ment

Department of Neurology, Yale School of Medicine, New Haven, CT 06520, USA

Laura R. Ment

Center for Molecular Medicine, Wayne State University, Detroit, MI 48202, USA

Roberto Romero

Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, University of Michigan School of Medicine, Ann Arbor, MI, 48104, USA

Roberto Romero

Department of Epidemiology, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI 48825, USA.

Roberto Romero

Contributions

M.E.T., D.S., R.R., L.R.M., S.S.H., and L.Y. designed research; A.P., S.B., and E.H.A. performed research; M.E.T., D.S., J.H.M., L.E.G., J.H., N.M., and T.C. analyzed data; and M.E.T., D.S., R.R., L.Y. and L.M. wrote the paper.

Competing interests

The authors declare no competing financial interests.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Moriah E. Thomason.