Developmental changes of cortical white–gray contrast as predictors of autism diagnosis and severity

Abstract

Recent studies suggest that both cortical gray and white-matter microstructural characteristics are distinct for subjects with autism. There is a lack of evidence regarding how these characteristics change in a developmental context. We analysed a longitudinal/cross-sectional dataset of 402 magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans (171 subjects with autism and 231 with typical development) from the Autism Brain Imaging Data Exchange, cohorts I–II (ABIDE-I-II). In the longitudinal sample, we computed the rate of change in the white–gray contrast, a measure which has been related to age and cognitive performance, at the boundary of the cerebral cortex. Then, we devised an analogous metric for the cross-sectional sample of the ABIDE dataset to measure age-related differences in cortical contrast. Further, we developed a probabilistic model to predict the diagnostic group in the longitudinal sample of the cortical contrast change data, using results obtained from the cross-sectional sample. In both subsets, we observed a similar overall pattern of greater decrease within the autistic population in intensity contrast for most cortical regions (81%), with occasional increases, mostly in primary sensory regions. This pattern correlated well with raw and calibrated behavioural scores. The prediction results show 76% accuracy for the whole-cortex diagnostic prediction and 86% accuracy in prediction using the motor system alone. Our results support a contrast change analysis strategy that appears sensitive in predicting diagnostic outcome and symptom severity in autism spectrum disorder, and is readily extensible to other MRI-based studies of neurodevelopmental cohorts.

Quantifying individual differences in brain morphometry underlying symptom severity in Autism Spectrum Disorders

“…Together, present results derived from rigorous testing and validation techniques suggest that subject-level variation in brain properties are important characteristics in the expression of ASD. Present findings were limited to cortical thickness and surface area features, and other properties across different measures of brain structure and function could account for larger proportions of variance in symptom severity 59 . The robustness of the subject-level distance-based approach is nevertheless promising.…”

Large-scale analyses of the relationship between sex, age and intelligence quotient heterogeneity and cortical morphometry in autism spectrum disorder

“…It should be noted that other factors can affect cortical thickness measurements; for example, altered cortical myelination or reduced integrity of the gray-white matter boundary, potentially resulting from deficits in neuronal migration during early development. Specifically, this blurring of the cortical interface has been demonstrated in individuals with ASD in both histological post-mortem 59 and in-vivo neuroimaging studies 60,61 , and could potentially lead to inaccuracies in cortical thickness estimates due to misplacement of the cortical boundary, with apparent increases in cortical thickness.…”

Gender Related Changes in Gene Expression Induced by Valproic Acid in A Mouse Model of Autism and the Correction by S-adenosyl Methionine. Does It Explain the Gender Differences in Autistic Like Behavior?

“…Several brain structures and functions have been suggested to underlie behavioral abnormalities of ASD including the prefrontal cerebral cortex [37], the cerebellum, the hippocampus and the basolateral amygdala [38]. The prefrontal cerebral cortex is affected in ASD at the neuronal development and synaptic functionality levels.…”