Title: A Framework for Brain Atlases: An Overview and Discussion on Selecting an Atlas for a Study.
Session: Educational Course
Speaker: Andrew Revell
Brain atlases are essential tools for studying brain function and organization. The abundance of available atlases used across the neuroscience literature, however, creates an implicit challenge that may alter the hypotheses and predictions we make about neurological function and pathophysiology. In this educational course presentation, we will first take an overview of many common brain atlases used in the literature. We will discuss how atlases are typically created and the wide variety of features contained within the atlases. We will then look at a specific case-study on how parcellation scale, shape, and anatomical coverage may impact our prediction of the brain's function from its underlying structure (i.e., the structure-function relationship within the brain). We show that the power to test a specific hypothesis about epilepsy pathophysiology may change because of atlas choice and atlas features. Finally, we propose a generalized framework for selecting a brain atlas for a study with respect to the previous discussion and findings. We hope this presentation provides guidance to other investigators utilizing the various atlases published over the last century in their own work.
