Large Data on the Small Brain: Population-wide Cerebellar Growth Models of Children and Adolescents

In the past, the cerebellum has been best known for its crucial role in motor function. However, increasingly more findings highlight the importance of cerebellar contributions in cognitive functions and neurodevelopment. Using large scale, population-wide neuroimaging data, we describe and provide detailed, openly available models of cerebellar development in childhood and adolescence, an important time period for brain development and onset of neuropsychiatric disorders. Next to a traditionally used anatomical parcellation of the cerebellum, we generated growth models based on a recently proposed functional parcellation. In both, we find an anterior-posterior growth gradient mirroring the age-related improvements of underlying behavior and function, which is analogous to cerebral maturation patterns and offers new evidence for directly related cerebello-cortical developmental trajectories. Finally, we illustrate how the current approach can be used to detect cerebellar abnormalities in clinical samples.