{
  "abstract": "Asymmetry in white matter is believed to give rise to the brain's capacity for specialized processing and is involved in the lateralization of various cognitive processes, such as language and visuo-spatial reasoning. Although studies of white matter asymmetry have been previously documented, they have often been constrained by limited age ranges, sample sizes, or the scope of the tracts and structural features examined. While normative lifespan charts for brain structures are emerging, comprehensive charts detailing white matter asymmetries across numerous pathways and diverse structural measures have been notably absent. This study addresses this gap by leveraging a large-scale dataset of 35,120 typically developing and aging individuals, ranging from 0 to 100 years of age, from 50 primary neuroimaging studies. We generated comprehensive lifespan trajectories for 30 lateralized association and projection white matter tracts, examining six distinct microstructural and macrostructural features of these pathways. Our findings reveal that: (1) asymmetries are widespread across the brain's white matter and are present in all 30 pathways; (2) for a given pathway, the degree and direction of asymmetry differ between features of tissue microstructure and pathway macrostructure; (3) asymmetries vary across and within pathway types (association and projection tracts); and (4) these asymmetries are not static, following unique trajectories across the lifespan, with distinct changes during development, and a general trend of becoming more asymmetric with increasing age (particularly in later adulthood) across pathways. This study represents the most extensive characterization of white matter asymmetry across the lifespan to date, charting how lateralization patterns emerge, mature, and change throughout life. It provides a foundational resource for understanding the principles of white matter organization from early to late life, its relation to functional specialization and inter-individual variability, and offers a key reference for interpreting deviations during healthy development and aging as well as those associated with clinical populations.",
  "abstract_shown": true,
  "affiliations": [
    "Medical Scientist Training Program Vanderbilt University Nashville Tennessee USA",
    "Department of Computer Science Vanderbilt University Nashville Tennessee USA",
    "Department of Psychological Science and Neuroscience Belmont University Nashville Tennessee USA",
    "Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering Vanderbilt University Nashville Tennessee USA",
    "Vanderbilt Brain Institute Vanderbilt University Nashville Tennessee USA",
    "Vanderbilt Genetics Institute Vanderbilt University Medical Center Nashville Tennessee USA",
    "Vanderbilt Memory and Alzheimer's Center Vanderbilt University Medical Center Nashville Tennessee USA",
    "Department of Medicine Vanderbilt University Medical Center Nashville Tennessee USA",
    "Department of Neurology Vanderbilt University Medical Center Nashville Tennessee USA",
    "Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences Vanderbilt University Medical Center Nashville Tennessee USA",
    "Department of Psychology and Human Development Vanderbilt University Nashville Tennessee USA",
    "Department of Biomedical Engineering Vanderbilt University Nashville Tennessee USA",
    "Department of Radiology and Radiological Sciences Vanderbilt University Medical Center Nashville Tennessee USA",
    "Vanderbilt University Institute of Imaging Science Nashville Tennessee USA",
    "Department of Neurological Surgery Vanderbilt University Medical Center Nashville Tennessee USA",
    "Laboratory of Behavioral Neuroscience National Institute on Aging, National Institutes of Health Baltimore Maryland USA",
    "Department of Special Education Peabody College of Education and Human Development Nashville Tennessee USA",
    "Life Span Institute and Department of Psychology University of Kansas Lawrence Kansas USA",
    "Department of Computer Science Park University Parkville Missouri USA",
    "Department of Biostatistics Vanderbilt University Medical Center Nashville Tennessee USA",
    "Brain Connectivity and Behaviour Laboratory Paris France",
    "Donders Centre for Cognition Radboud University Nijmegen the Netherlands",
    "Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics Nijmegen the Netherlands"
  ],
  "article_type": null,
  "arxiv": null,
  "author_total": 34,
  "authors": [
    {
      "affs": [
        0
      ],
      "name": "Sam Bogdanov",
      "orcid": "0000-0001-7766-4217"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        1
      ],
      "name": "Praitayini Kanakaraj",
      "orcid": "0000-0002-9979-217X"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        1
      ],
      "name": "Michael E. Kim",
      "orcid": "0009-0006-3562-2688"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        2
      ],
      "name": "Jessica Samir"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        3
      ],
      "name": "Chenyu Gao",
      "orcid": "0000-0003-2098-3035"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        1,
        3
      ],
      "name": "Karthik Ramadass",
      "orcid": "0000-0002-4610-3860"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        3
      ],
      "name": "Gaurav Rudravaram",
      "orcid": "0009-0001-9087-462X"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        1
      ],
      "name": "Nancy R. Newlin",
      "orcid": "0000-0003-3714-4684"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        4,
        5,
        6
      ],
      "name": "Derek B. Archer",
      "orcid": "0000-0001-8638-0785"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        5,
        6
      ],
      "name": "Timothy J. Hohman",
      "orcid": "0000-0002-3377-7014"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        7,
        8,
        9,
        10,
        6
      ],
      "name": "Angela Lee Jefferson",
      "orcid": "0000-0002-8245-0587"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        11,
        12,
        13
      ],
      "name": "Victoria L. Morgan",
      "orcid": "0000-0001-8263-2324"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        13
      ],
      "name": "Alexandra Roche"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        11,
        1,
        3,
        14,
        12
      ],
      "name": "Dario J. Englot",
      "orcid": "0000-0001-8373-690X"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        15
      ],
      "name": "Susan M. Resnick",
      "orcid": "0000-0003-1115-7145"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        15
      ],
      "name": "Lori L. Beason‐Held",
      "orcid": "0000-0001-9057-6270"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        16,
        4
      ],
      "name": "Laurie E. Cutting",
      "orcid": "0000-0002-2362-6028"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        16
      ],
      "name": "Laura A. Barquero",
      "orcid": "0000-0002-4279-3745"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        16
      ],
      "name": "Micah A. D’Archangel"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        16,
        4,
        13
      ],
      "name": "Tin Q. Nguyen"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        10
      ],
      "name": "Kathryn Leigh Humphreys",
      "orcid": "0000-0002-5715-6597"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        10
      ],
      "name": "Yanbin Niu",
      "orcid": "0009-0005-1199-4033"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        10
      ],
      "name": "Sophia Vinci‐Booher",
      "orcid": "0000-0002-3626-146X"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        17
      ],
      "name": "Carissa J. Cascio",
      "orcid": "0000-0001-9560-9203"
    },
    {
      "name": "The HABS-HD Study Team"
    },
    {
      "name": "Alzheimer’s Disease Neuroimaging Initiative"
    },
    {
      "name": "The BIOCARD Study Team"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        18
      ],
      "name": "Zhiyuan Li",
      "orcid": "0009-0005-6361-3191"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        19
      ],
      "name": "Simon Vandekar",
      "orcid": "0000-0002-7457-9073"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        19,
        6
      ],
      "name": "Panpan Zhang",
      "orcid": "0000-0002-8211-5930"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        11,
        12,
        13
      ],
      "name": "John C. Gore",
      "orcid": "0000-0002-9480-0900"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        20,
        21,
        22
      ],
      "name": "Stephanie J. Forkel",
      "orcid": "0000-0003-0493-0283"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        1,
        3,
        8,
        10,
        4
      ],
      "name": "Bennett A. Landman",
      "orcid": "0000-0001-5733-2127"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        12,
        13
      ],
      "name": "Kurt G. Schilling",
      "orcid": "0000-0003-3686-7645"
    }
  ],
  "bibtex": "https://research.draconitic.com/paper/5fey3wkkzjap2.bib",
  "cited_by": 7,
  "doi": "10.1002/hbm.70519",
  "fulltext_url": null,
  "id": "5fey3wkkzjap2",
  "issns": [
    "1065-9471",
    "1097-0193"
  ],
  "landing_url": "https://doi.org/10.1002/hbm.70519",
  "language": "en",
  "licence": "CC-BY",
  "licence_label": "CC BY",
  "licence_source": "journal",
  "licence_url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/",
  "metadata_licence": null,
  "native_subjects": [
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      "2805|Hemispheric Asymmetry in Neuroscience"
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  "openalex": "W7163736066",
  "pdf_url": null,
  "pmcid": "PMC12621989",
  "pmid": "41256533",
  "published": "2026-06-01",
  "publisher": "Wiley",
  "ris": "https://research.draconitic.com/paper/5fey3wkkzjap2.ris",
  "sources": [
    {
      "first_seen": "2026-11-11T13:20:32Z",
      "native_id": "W7163736066",
      "source": "openalex",
      "url": "https://doi.org/10.1002/hbm.70519"
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  "subjects": [
    {
      "field": "biology",
      "origin": "openalex:2805|Hemispheric Asymmetry in Neuroscience",
      "subfield": "neuroscience"
    }
  ],
  "title": "Lifespan Trajectories of Asymmetry in White Matter Tracts",
  "title_text": "Lifespan Trajectories of Asymmetry in White Matter Tracts",
  "type": "peer-reviewed",
  "updated_at": "2026-11-13T13:21:09Z",
  "url": "https://research.draconitic.com/paper/5fey3wkkzjap2",
  "venue": "Human Brain Mapping",
  "versions": []
}