Cortical thickness or grey matter volume? The importance of selecting the phenotype for imaging genetics studies.

Adult; Aged; Aged, 80 and over; Brain/anatomy & histology; Brain Mapping/methods; Female; Humans; Image Interpretation, Computer-Assisted; Magnetic Resonance Imaging; Male; Middle Aged; Pedigree; Phenotype; Quantitative Trait, Heritable

Abstract :

[en] Choosing the appropriate neuroimaging phenotype is critical to successfully identify genes that influence brain structure or function. While neuroimaging methods provide numerous potential phenotypes, their role for imaging genetics studies is unclear. Here we examine the relationship between brain volume, grey matter volume, cortical thickness and surface area, from a genetic standpoint. Four hundred and eighty-six individuals from randomly ascertained extended pedigrees with high-quality T1-weighted neuroanatomic MRI images participated in the study. Surface-based and voxel-based representations of brain structure were derived, using automated methods, and these measurements were analysed using a variance-components method to identify the heritability of these traits and their genetic correlations. All neuroanatomic traits were significantly influenced by genetic factors. Cortical thickness and surface area measurements were found to be genetically and phenotypically independent. While both thickness and area influenced volume measurements of cortical grey matter, volume was more closely related to surface area than cortical thickness. This trend was observed for both the volume-based and surface-based techniques. The results suggest that surface area and cortical thickness measurements should be considered separately and preferred over gray matter volumes for imaging genetic studies.

Disciplines :

Anatomy (cytology, histology, embryology...) & physiology

Author, co-author :

Winkler, Anderson ; Université de Liège - ULiège > Form. doc. sc. bioméd. & pharma.

Kochunov, Peter

Blangero, John

Almasy, Laura

Zilles, Karl

Fox, Peter T.

Duggirala, Ravindranath

Glahn, David C.

Language :

English

Title :

Cortical thickness or grey matter volume? The importance of selecting the phenotype for imaging genetics studies.

Publication date :

2010

Journal title :

NeuroImage

ISSN :

1053-8119

eISSN :

1095-9572

Publisher :

Elsevier, Amsterdam, Netherlands

Volume :

Issue :

Pages :

1135-46

Peer reviewed :

Peer Reviewed verified by ORBi

Commentary :

Available on ORBi :

since 03 May 2017

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372 (0 by ULiège)

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Scopus citations^®

888

Scopus citations^®
without self-citations

836

OpenCitations

825

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