Mapping cortical anatomy in preschool aged children with autism using surface-based morphometry

Abstract

The challenges of gathering in-vivo measures of brain anatomy from young children have limited the number of independent studies examining neuroanatomical differences between children with autism and typically developing controls (TDCs) during early life, and almost all studies in this critical developmental window focus on global or lobar measures of brain volume. Using a novel cohort of young males with Autistic Disorder and TDCs aged 2 to 5 years, we (i) tested for group differences in traditional measures of global anatomy (total brain, total white, total gray and total cortical volume), and (ii) employed surface-based methods for cortical morphometry to directly measure the two biologically distinct sub-components of cortical volume (CV) at high spatial resolution—cortical thickness (CT) and surface area (SA). While measures of global brain anatomy did not show statistically significant group differences, children with autism showed focal, and CT-specific anatomical disruptions compared to TDCs, consisting of relative cortical thickening in regions with central roles in behavioral regulation, and the processing of language, biological movement and social information. Our findings demonstrate the focal nature of brain involvement in early autism, and provide more spatially and morphometrically specific anatomical phenotypes for subsequent translational study.