Gyrification from constrained cortical expansion
Abstract
The convolutions of the human brain are a symbol of its functional complexity and correlated with its information-processing capacity. Conversely, loss of folds is correlated with loss of function. But how did the outer surface of the brain, the layered cortex of neuronal gray matter, get its folds? Guided by prior experimental observations of the growth of the cortex relative to the underlying white matter, we argue that these folds arise due to a mechanical instability of a soft tissue that grows nonuniformly. Numerical simulations and physical mimics of the constrained growth of the cortex show how compressive mechanical forces sculpt it to form characteristic sulci and gyri, consistent with observations across species in both normal and pathological situations.
- Publication:
-
Proceedings of the National Academy of Science
- Pub Date:
- September 2014
- DOI:
- 10.1073/pnas.1406015111
- arXiv:
- arXiv:1503.03853
- Bibcode:
- 2014PNAS..11112667T
- Keywords:
-
- Physics - Biological Physics;
- Condensed Matter - Soft Condensed Matter;
- Nonlinear Sciences - Pattern Formation and Solitons;
- Quantitative Biology - Tissues and Organs
- E-Print:
- Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 111.35 (2014): 12667-12672