IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/nat/natcom/v9y2018i1d10.1038_s41467-018-04921-2.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Mouse MRI shows brain areas relatively larger in males emerge before those larger in females

Author

Listed:
  • Lily R. Qiu

    (University of Toronto
    The Hospital for Sick Children
    The Hospital for Sick Children)

  • Darren J. Fernandes

    (The Hospital for Sick Children
    University of Toronto)

  • Kamila U. Szulc-Lerch

    (The Hospital for Sick Children
    The Hospital for Sick Children)

  • Jun Dazai

    (The Hospital for Sick Children)

  • Brian J. Nieman

    (The Hospital for Sick Children
    University of Toronto)

  • Daniel H. Turnbull

    (New York University School of Medicine
    New York University School of Medicine)

  • Jane A. Foster

    (McMaster University)

  • Mark R. Palmert

    (University of Toronto
    The Hospital for Sick Children
    The University of Toronto)

  • Jason P. Lerch

    (The Hospital for Sick Children
    The Hospital for Sick Children
    University of Toronto)

Abstract

Sex differences exist in behaviors, disease and neuropsychiatric disorders. Sexual dimorphisms however, have yet to be studied across the whole brain and across a comprehensive time course of postnatal development. Here, we use manganese-enhanced MRI (MEMRI) to longitudinally image male and female C57BL/6J mice across 9 time points, beginning at postnatal day 3. We recapitulate findings on canonically dimorphic areas, demonstrating MEMRI’s ability to study neuroanatomical sex differences. We discover, upon whole-brain volume correction, that neuroanatomical regions larger in males develop earlier than those larger in females. Groups of areas with shared sexually dimorphic developmental trajectories reflect behavioral and functional networks, and expression of genes involved with sex processes. Also, post-pubertal neuroanatomy is highly individualized, and individualization occurs earlier in males. Our results demonstrate the ability of MEMRI to reveal comprehensive developmental differences between male and female brains, which will improve our understanding of sex-specific predispositions to various neuropsychiatric disorders.

Suggested Citation

  • Lily R. Qiu & Darren J. Fernandes & Kamila U. Szulc-Lerch & Jun Dazai & Brian J. Nieman & Daniel H. Turnbull & Jane A. Foster & Mark R. Palmert & Jason P. Lerch, 2018. "Mouse MRI shows brain areas relatively larger in males emerge before those larger in females," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 9(1), pages 1-15, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:nat:natcom:v:9:y:2018:i:1:d:10.1038_s41467-018-04921-2
    DOI: 10.1038/s41467-018-04921-2
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-018-04921-2
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1038/s41467-018-04921-2?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Fae N. Kronman & Josephine K. Liwang & Rebecca Betty & Daniel J. Vanselow & Yuan-Ting Wu & Nicholas J. Tustison & Ashwin Bhandiwad & Steffy B. Manjila & Jennifer A. Minteer & Donghui Shin & Choong Heo, 2024. "Developmental mouse brain common coordinate framework," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 15(1), pages 1-17, December.
    2. Svenja Küchenhoff & Şeyma Bayrak & Rachel G. Zsido & Amin Saberi & Boris C. Bernhardt & Susanne Weis & H. Lina Schaare & Julia Sacher & Simon Eickhoff & Sofie L. Valk, 2024. "Relating sex-bias in human cortical and hippocampal microstructure to sex hormones," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 15(1), pages 1-19, December.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:nat:natcom:v:9:y:2018:i:1:d:10.1038_s41467-018-04921-2. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.nature.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.