Can a baby’s brain connectome act like a fingerprint?

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In dHCP preterm infants, structural connectomes identified individuals ~62% of the time (mean self r=0.90), while functional connectomes rarely did (~10%).

Source

The developing brain structural and functional connectome fingerprint

Ciarrusta J, Christiaens D, Fitzgibbon SP, et al. · Developmental cognitive neuroscience · 2022

doi.org/10.1016/j.dcn.2022.101117 Read the full paper ↗28 citationscc by

Study at a glance

Design: Cohort — dHCP preterm infants scanned twice (preterm + term-equivalent) for connectome fingerprinting
N: N=45 · 45 infants with usable structural connectomes; 31 with functional; 26 with both
Population: Preterm infants in the developing Human Connectome Project
Outcome: Within-subject vs between-subject connectome similarity / identifiability

Structured fields used in claim comparison tables when every cited study has a complete layer.

What they did

Compared structural and functional connectomes from paired preterm and term-equivalent MRI scans in the developing Human Connectome Project, quantifying self-similarity, self-to-other similarity, and identifiability, plus effects of PMA and days between scans.

What they found

Structural mean self-similarity r=0.90 and identifiability 28/45 (62.22%); functional mean self-similarity r=0.56 and identifiability only 3/31 (9.68%). Older PMA at first scan correlated with higher structural self-similarity; more days between scans reduced functional self-similarity.

The limits

What it doesn't show

Does not prove functional networks lack individual meaning—only that early functional fingerprints are less stable/identifying across this interval than structural ones.

Key terms

Connectome fingerprint: Individual-specific connectivity pattern enabling identification across scans.
Structural connectome: White-matter connectivity matrix from diffusion MRI/tractography.
Functional connectome: Correlated BOLD activity matrix from fMRI.
PMA: Postmenstrual age at scanning.
dHCP: Developing Human Connectome Project neonatal MRI resource.

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Quiz yourself

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Structural connectome identifiability was:

Common questions

Structural identifiability?

28/45 (62.22%).

Functional identifiability?

3/31 (9.68%).

Mean structural self r?

0.90.

Cohort?

dHCP preterm infants scanned twice.