Abstract

Comparing the brains of related species faces the challenges of establishing homologies whilst accommodating evolutionary specializations. Here we propose a general framework for understanding similarities and differences between the brains of primates. The approach uses white matter blueprints of the whole cortex based on a set of white matter tracts that can be anatomically matched across species. The blueprints provide a common reference space that allows us to navigate between brains of different species, identify homologous cortical areas, or to transform whole cortical maps from one species to the other. Specializations are cast within this framework as deviations between the species' blueprints. We illustrate how this approach can be used to compare human and macaque brains.

Data availability

The human diffusion MRI data was obtained from the Human Connectome Project (www.humanconnectome.org.). Tractography protocols for building the blueprints, code, and results are available for download from Gitlab at https://git.fmrib.ox.ac.uk/rmars/comparing-connectivity-blueprints.git.

The following previously published data sets were used

Article and author information

Author details

  1. Rogier B Mars

    Nuffield Department of Clinical Neurosciences, University of Oxford, Oxford, United Kingdom
    For correspondence
    rogier.mars@psy.ox.ac.uk
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
    ORCID icon "This ORCID iD identifies the author of this article:" 0000-0001-6302-8631
  2. Stamatios N Sotiropoulos

    Nuffield Department of Clinical Neurosciences, University of Oxford, Oxford, United Kingdom
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
    ORCID icon "This ORCID iD identifies the author of this article:" 0000-0003-4735-5776
  3. Richard E Passingham

    Department of Experimental Psychology, University of Oxford, Oxford, United Kingdom
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
  4. Jerome Sallet

    Department of Experimental Psychology, University of Oxford, Oxford, United Kingdom
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
    ORCID icon "This ORCID iD identifies the author of this article:" 0000-0002-7878-0209
  5. Lennart M Verhagen

    Department of Experimental Psychology, University of Oxford, Oxford, United Kingdom
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
  6. Alexandre A Khrapitchev

    Department of Oncology, University of Oxford, Oxford, United Kingdom
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
    ORCID icon "This ORCID iD identifies the author of this article:" 0000-0002-7616-6635
  7. Nicola Sibson

    Department of Oncology, University of Oxford, Oxford, United Kingdom
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
  8. Saad Jbabdi

    Nuffield Department of Clinical Neurosciences, University of Oxford, Oxford, United Kingdom
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.

Funding

Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BB/N019814/1)

  • Rogier B Mars

Medical Research Council (MR/L009013/1)

  • Saad Jbabdi

Wellcome (203139/Z/16/Z)

  • Rogier B Mars
  • Jerome Sallet
  • Saad Jbabdi

Nederlandse Organisatie voor Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek (452-­13-­015)

  • Rogier B Mars

Cancer Research UK (C5255/A15935)

  • Alexandre A Khrapitchev
  • Nicola Sibson

The funders had no role in study design, data collection and interpretation, or the decision to submit the work for publication.

Reviewing Editor

  1. Klaas Enno Stephan, University of Zurich and ETH Zurich, Switzerland

Version history

  1. Received: January 19, 2018
  2. Accepted: May 7, 2018
  3. Accepted Manuscript published: May 11, 2018 (version 1)
  4. Version of Record published: June 1, 2018 (version 2)

Copyright

© 2018, Mars et al.

This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License permitting unrestricted use and redistribution provided that the original author and source are credited.

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  1. Rogier B Mars
  2. Stamatios N Sotiropoulos
  3. Richard E Passingham
  4. Jerome Sallet
  5. Lennart M Verhagen
  6. Alexandre A Khrapitchev
  7. Nicola Sibson
  8. Saad Jbabdi
(2018)
Whole brain comparative anatomy using connectivity blueprints
eLife 7:e35237.
https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.35237

Share this article

https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.35237

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