In the 1990s, advances in Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) made it possible to image reliably and non-invasively the functioning human brain. The adaptation of these powerful methods for use with children will provide the means for us to begin to address the basic questions about the development of the brain systems that underlie basic cognitive functions. In this project we will focus on the linguistic and cognitive domains that have been major areas of focus within the Center, specifically, lexical access, complex syntactic processing, spatial cognition and spatial attention. In our preliminary studies, we have developed a number of imaging protocols for studies in each of these domains, and have collected reliable imaging data from both adults and a small number of children for each measure. We will use blood oxygen level dependent (BOLD) imaging in our functional activation studies. BOLD imaging provides an indirect measure of local cerebral blood flow (CBF) to active brain areas. In all of the tasks proposed here, we will use a standard BOLD activation design in which participants are presented with alternating periods of a target task and a control task while the brains are continuously imaged. This design systematically engages and disengages brain areas critical for the target task. Data analyses are designed to detect brain regions where the rise and fall of activity is correlated with these alternating task parameters In addition to our functional activation studies, we will also include an examination of an important physiological function, cerebral blood flow. This work will provide basic information on developmental change in the distribution and integrity of cerebral blood perfusion. All of the studies included in this project focus on basic developmental questions. In this project normally developing children from 7 years of age through adolescence, plus adult controls will be tested. The intent is to develop the essential normative developmental profiles of brain-behavior relations. The normative profiles will then serve as the basis for questions about cognitive and neural development in our patient populations.
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