Precision Cortex Tractography for the Developing Brain

Motivation: Tractography is a powerful tool for studying white matter, but its effectiveness in the developing brain is limited by low anisotropy, gyral bias, and partial volume effects. Goal(s): We developed an approach for precise reconstruction of white matter pathways in the infant brain, especially in relation to the cortex. Approach: Our method combines sub-voxel information from diffusion MRI with cortical geometry from anatomical MRI to guide tractography. Results: Our method produces tractograms connecting to the cortex at both ends, covering 99% of the cortical mesh. This enables infants cortical connectivity quantification while minimizing the influence of gyral bias and low anisotropy. Impact: Our tractography method outperforms commonly used algorithms in generating accurate tractograms for studying early human brain development.