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Medical-image Analysis and Statistical Interpretation Lab

White matter micro- and macrostructure brain charts for the human lifespan

Posted by on Thursday, May 21, 2026 in Diffusion Weighted MRI, Magnetic resonance imaging, News, Normative Modeling, White Matter.

Michael E. Kim, Chenyu Gao, Karthik Ramadass, Nancy R. Newlin, Praitayini Kanakaraj, Sam Bogdanov, Gaurav Rudravaram, Derek Archer, Timothy J. Hohman, Angela L. Jefferson, Victoria L. Morgan, Alexandra Roche, Dario J. Englot, Susan M. Resnick, Lori L. Beason Held, Laurie E. Cutting, Laura A. Barquero, Micah A. D’archangel, Tin Q. Nguyen, Kathryn L. Humphreys, Yanbin Niu, Sophia Vinci-Booher, Carissa J. Cascio, The HABS-HD Study Team, Alzheimer’s Disease Neuroimaging Initiative, The BIOCARD Study Team, L. Taylor Davis, Zhiyuan Li, Simon N. Vandekar, Panpan Zhang, John Gore, Bennett A. Landman, Kurt G. Schilling. White matter micro- and macrostructure brain charts for the human lifespan. Nature (2026). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-026-10454-2.

Figure 1. Global White Matter Brain Charts Across the Human Lifespan. A) Data were aggregated from 50 imaging studies, comprising N=35,120 scans from typically developing participants aged 0 to 100 years, forming the basis for the lifespan WM brain charts. Violin plots show the age distribution for each study colored by the number of typically developing/aging participants. B) Raw data points illustrate the distribution of global WM metrics (Volume, FA, MD, AD, RD) across the lifespan for males (cyan) and females (red). C) Normative trajectories for each metric, modeled using GAMLSS, show the median (solid lines) and 2.5th/97.5th percentiles (dotted lines). D) Normalized quantile ranges (difference between 25th and 75th percentiles divided by the median) depict changes in population variability across the lifespan for each global WM feature. E) The normative rate of change (d/d_(log⁡(age))) for the median centile visualizes the velocity of WM development with age, highlighting that growth and decline are most rapid early in life and that different WM features reach their peak or minimum values at distinct ages. The horizontal line (y=0) denotes critical points where the derivative of the trajectories change sign. Note: The x-axes (age in years) are log-scaled to emphasize developmental and aging periods.

Abstract: The human brain relies on a complex network of connections to function, with white matter (WM) acting as the primary communication highway between different brain regions. Disruptions in these critical communication pathways are linked to several neurological, psychiatric, and developmental disorders. While clinicians have long used standard growth charts to track physical development, with more recent work translating these to whole brain and gray matter measurements, there has been no equivalent reference standard for WM. Establishing a readily available normative reference is an imperative first step if we hope to utilize these WM structural biomarkers clinically. Here we present lifespan reference charts for human brain WM. By processing and standardizing 35,120 brain scans from diverse global studies, we mapped the typical growth, maturation, and age-related decline of specific brain pathways from birth through 100 years of age. These reference charts establish a fundamental benchmark for healthy brain development and aging, allowing researchers and clinicians to quantify how an individual’s brain deviates from typical patterns and highlighting disorder-related alterations. Furthermore, the accompanying open-access charts enable the scientific and clinical communities to evaluate new patient and research data against these normative baselines, facilitating future clinical and neuroscience studies.

 

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