Neurodevelopment of the association cortices: Patterns, mechanisms, and implications for psychopathology.
| Publication Type | Review |
| Authors | Sydnor V, Larsen B, Bassett D, Alexander-Bloch A, Fair D, Liston C, Mackey A, Milham M, Pines A, Roalf D, Seidlitz J, Xu T, Raznahan A, Satterthwaite T |
| Journal | Neuron |
| Volume | 109 |
| Issue | 18 |
| Pagination | 2820-2846 |
| Date Published | 07/15/2021 |
| ISSN | 1097-4199 |
| Keywords | Cerebral Cortex, Mental Disorders, Neuronal Plasticity |
| Abstract | The human brain undergoes a prolonged period of cortical development that spans multiple decades. During childhood and adolescence, cortical development progresses from lower-order, primary and unimodal cortices with sensory and motor functions to higher-order, transmodal association cortices subserving executive, socioemotional, and mentalizing functions. The spatiotemporal patterning of cortical maturation thus proceeds in a hierarchical manner, conforming to an evolutionarily rooted, sensorimotor-to-association axis of cortical organization. This developmental program has been characterized by data derived from multimodal human neuroimaging and is linked to the hierarchical unfolding of plasticity-related neurobiological events. Critically, this developmental program serves to enhance feature variation between lower-order and higher-order regions, thus endowing the brain's association cortices with unique functional properties. However, accumulating evidence suggests that protracted plasticity within late-maturing association cortices, which represents a defining feature of the human developmental program, also confers risk for diverse developmental psychopathologies. |
| DOI | 10.1016/j.neuron.2021.06.016 |
| PubMed ID | 34270921 |
| PubMed Central ID | PMC8448958 |