Amano Hideki, Tanabe Hiroki C, Ogihara Naomichi
Department of Biological Sciences, Graduate School of Science, The University of Tokyo, Tokyo, 113-0033, Japan.
Department of Cognitive and Psychological Sciences, Graduate School of Informatics, Nagoya University, Nagoya, 464-8601, Japan.
Brain Struct Funct. 2025 Jan 24;230(2):34. doi: 10.1007/s00429-025-02896-7.
To achieve a better understanding of the evolution of the large brain in humans, a comparative analysis of species differences in the brains of extant primate species is crucial, as it allows direct comparisons of the brains. We developed a method to achieve anatomically precise region-to-region homologous brain transformations across species using computational neuroanatomy. Utilizing three-dimensional neuroimaging data from humans (Homo sapiens), chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes), and Japanese macaques (Macaca fuscata), along with the anatomical labels of their respective brains, we aimed to create a cross-species average template brain that preserves neuroanatomical correspondence across species. Homologous transformation of the brain from one species to another can be computed using the cross-species average brain. Applying this transformation to human and chimpanzee brains revealed that, compared to chimpanzees, humans had significantly larger and more expanded prefrontal cortex, middle and posterior temporal gyrus, angular gyrus, precuneus, and cortical areas associated with mentalization. This neuroanatomically homologous brain transformation enables the systematic investigation of the similarities and differences in brain anatomy and structure across different species.
为了更好地理解人类大脑的进化，对现存灵长类物种大脑的物种差异进行比较分析至关重要，因为这能直接比较大脑。我们开发了一种方法，利用计算神经解剖学实现跨物种的解剖学精确的区域对区域的同源大脑转换。利用来自人类（智人）、黑猩猩（黑猩猩）和日本猕猴（猕猴）的三维神经成像数据，以及它们各自大脑的解剖学标签，我们旨在创建一个跨物种平均模板大脑，该大脑保留了跨物种的神经解剖学对应关系。可以使用跨物种平均大脑计算从一个物种到另一个物种的大脑同源转换。将这种转换应用于人类和黑猩猩的大脑表明，与黑猩猩相比，人类的前额叶皮层、颞中回和颞后回、角回、楔前叶以及与心理化相关的皮质区域明显更大且更扩展。这种神经解剖学同源大脑转换能够系统地研究不同物种大脑解剖结构的异同。
