Lots to enjoy in this new paper by Sam Vickery @sbe.bsky.social and others. Brain areas in humans that show the greatest expansion from chimp -> human are the areas that are most susceptible to to the effects of aging www.science.org/doi/10.1126/... - ThreadSky

jimthommo.bsky.social • 183 days ago

Lots to enjoy in this new paper by Sam Vickery @sbe.bsky.social and others. Brain areas in humans that show the greatest expansion from chimp -> human are the areas that are most susceptible to to the effects of aging https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.ado2733

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jimthommo.bsky.social•183 days ago

I don't love VBM approaches but that aside, I really like their data-driven approach to brain segmentation and trying to balance local and global features. We used a different, explicitly hierarchical approach a while back which has strengths but its own disadvantages https://www.nature.com/articles/s41588-021-00827-w

jimthommo.bsky.social•183 days ago

The "last-in, first-out" hypothesis is an interesting idea that has been floating around for a little while, and this is a really good demonstration of it's application to brain data. I'm excited to see how it extends to age-related pathological conditions like AD and PD

jimthommo.bsky.social•183 days ago

The implications of this hypo if strongly held are huge - if age-related brain pathology is most extensive in areas showing greatest expansion in humans from our closest great ape relatives, then we need to think _very_carefully about animal models of such pathology. I'm looking at you, mice

jimthommo.bsky.social•183 days ago

One tidbit I found super interesting (and not the main focus of the paper): the big expansion of ❤️lateral temporal cortex❤️ from macaque -> human is not present in chimp -> human, and the authors speculate might reflect an expansion in great apes. Very cool if this is the case

jimthommo.bsky.social•183 days ago

yes I'm the guy that goes straight to the brain images to see what LTC is doing, then reads the rest

jimthommo.bsky.social•183 days ago

Anyway, one last(?) thought on this paper: areas showing greatest expansion in humans include those (esp ofc) whose shape is influenced by genes that also influence face development. Future work might look at evo-devo influences on brain and face shape

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