Neurological and brain imaging challenges have significantly delayed treatment for people around the world suffering from conditions like Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, depression, and anxiety, hindering timely interventions and overall care.
Now, UCLA Health researchers have developed a new “digital toolbox” for brain network studies. With open-source software, it promises to help researchers globally overcome a longstanding obstacle in brain imaging research.
“As long as people have been interested in studying the brain, they have tried to map it out by answering a basic question: how many brain regions are there?” said study senior author Lucina Uddin, a UCLA Health Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences Professor and Director of the UCLA Brain Connectivity and Cognition Laboratory.
“You can divide the brain based on different attributes—cell structure, function, or some other characteristic—and there have been multiple different brain atlases developed over the years that have given different names to these divisions,” Uddin said. “But we have to agree if we want to talk across research groups and share findings.”
Around the world, companies and research groups are advancing brain imaging studies through open-source initiatives. For instance, the Human Connectome Project (HCP) focuses on mapping the brain’s network and provides researchers its global dataset and tools. Global cross-network communities can accelerate discoveries and advance potential cures by promoting data sharing and collaboration. The HCP is best known for offering high-quality neuroimaging data to support understanding the brain’s structure.
The new open-source software, the Network Correspondence Toolbox, allows researchers to upload their brain imaging data and compare it to 16 of the most widely used brain maps. This enables them to assess how closely their findings align with existing brain structures, making interpreting and analyzing brain networks easier.
Researchers and clinicians use brain imaging tools like MRIs to explore the underlying causes of various symptoms and disorders. Specific brain areas act as complex connection points, and this new mapping tool helps neurologists better understand how those areas interact, potentially leading to more precise treatments for neurological and psychiatric conditions.
“I’m hoping people will use this tool to find commonalities across findings that might otherwise have been hidden because of the inconsistent naming,” she says. “It could change the way we think about dividing up the brain. If so many groups create different atlases with slight differences, can this help inform us of the most common and reproducible patterns, and can we adopt more standards that build on those commonalities?”
This research was originally published in Nature Communications.
Chrissy Newton is a PR professional and founder of VOCAB Communications. She currently appears on The Discovery Channel and Max and hosts the Rebelliously Curious podcast, which can be found on The Debrief’s YouTube Channel on all audio podcast streaming platforms. Follow her on X: @ChrissyNewton and at chrissynewton.com.