Michel Thiebaut de Schotten

Institut des Maladies Neurodegeneratives | IMN · Neurofunctional imaging group (GIN)

Clinical neuroscience research relying on animal models brought valuable translational insights into the function and pathologies of the human brain. The anatomical, physiological, and behavioural similarities between humans and mammals have prompted researchers to study cerebral mechanisms at different levels to develop and test new treatments. Th...

There is more to brain connections than the mere transfer of signals between brain regions. Behavior and cognition emerge through cortical area interaction. This requires integration between local and distant areas orchestrated by densely connected networks. Brain connections determine the brain's functional organization. The imaging of connections...

Attention is a core cognitive function that filters and selects behaviourally relevant information in the environment. The cortical mapping of attentional systems identified two segregated networks that mediate stimulus-driven and goal-driven processes, the Ventral and the Dorsal Attention Networks (VAN, DAN). Deep brain electrophysiological record...

Although very well adapted to brain study, Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) remains limited by the facilities and capabilities required to acquire data, especially for non-human primates. Addressing the data gaps resulting from these limitations requires making data more accessible and open. In contempt of the regular use of Saimiri sciureus in neu...

These authors contributed equally to this work. Stroke significantly impacts the quality of life. However, the long-term cognitive evolution in stroke is poorly predictable at the individual level. There is an urgent need to better predict long-term symptoms based on acute clinical neu-roimaging data. Previous works have demonstrated a strong relat...

Attention is a heterogeneous function theoretically divided into alerting, orienting, and executive attention. While functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) has extensively characterized their functioning, the role of white matter in cognitive function has gained recent interest due to diffusion-weighted imaging advancements. However, most evi...

Integrating the underlying brain circuit's structural and functional architecture is required to explore the functional organization of cognitive networks properly. In that regard, we recently introduced the Functionnectome. This structural-functional method combines an fMRI acquisition with tractography-derived white matter connectivity data to ma...

The distributed nature of the neural substrate, and the difficulty of establishing necessity from correlative data, combine to render the mapping of brain function a far harder task than it seems. Methods capable of combining connective anatomical information with focal disruption of function are needed to disambiguate local from global neural depe...

The functional organization and related anatomy of executive functions are still largely unknown and were examined in the present study using a verbal fluency task. The objective of this study was to determine the cognitive architecture of a fluency task and related voxelwise anatomy in the GRECogVASC cohort and fMRI based meta-analytical data. Fir...

The ratio of T1-weighted/T2-weighted magnetic resonance images (T1w/T2w MRI) has been successfully applied at the cortical level since 2011 and is now one of the most used myelin mapping methods. However, no reports have explored the histological validity of T1w/T2w myelin mapping in white matter. Here we compare T1w/T2w with ex vivo postmortem his...

Attention is one of the most studied cognitive functions in brain-damaged populations or neurological syndromes, as its malfunction can be related to deficits in other higher cognitive functions. In the present study, we aimed at delimiting the attention deficits of a sample of brain-injured patients presenting confabulations by assessing their per...

Thirty years of functional neuroimaging have been accumulating a wealth of evidence of the intricate relationship between structure and function. However, potential overlap, independence, granularity of and gaps between functions remain poorly understood at the global level. In this study, we extracted the latent structure of the current brain-cogn...

Motricity is the most commonly affected ability after a stroke. While many clinical studies attempt to predict motor symptoms at different chronic time points after a stroke, longitudinal acute-to-chronic studies remain scarce. Taking advantage of recent advances in mapping brain disconnections, we predict motor outcomes in 62 patients assessed lon...

The distributed nature of the neural substrate, and the difficulty of establishing necessity from correlative data, combine to render the mapping of brain function a far harder task than it seems. Methods capable of combining connective anatomical information with focal disruption of function are needed to disambiguate local from global neural depe...

The present study aimed to investigate the role of connectivity disruptions in two fiber pathways, the uncinate fasciculus (UF) and the frontal aslant tract (FAT), in developmental dyslexia and determine the relationship between the connectivity of these pathways and behavioral performance in children with dyslexia. A total of 26 French children wi...

The corpus callosum (CC) is the principal white matter (WM) bundle supporting communication between the two brain hemispheres. Despite its importance, a comprehensive mapping of callosal connections is still lacking. Here, we constructed the first bidirectional population-based callosal connectional atlas between the midsagittal section of the CC a...

Cognitive functional neuroimaging has been around for over 30 years and has shed light on the brain areas relevant for reading. However, new methodological developments enable mapping the interaction between functional imaging and the underlying white matter networks. In this study, we used such a novel method, called the disconnectome, to decode t...

Background and objectives Although action slowing is the main cognitive impairment in stroke survivors, its mechanisms and determinants are still poorly understood. The objectives of the present study were to determine the mechanisms of post-stroke action slowing (using validated, highly specific simple reaction time (SRT) and tapping tests) and id...

Previous studies have reported anomalies in the arcuate fasciculus (AF) lateralization in developmental dyslexia (DD). Still, the relationship between AF lateralization and literacy skills in DD remains largely unknown. The purpose of our study is to investigate the relationship between the lateralization of the AF anterior segment (AFAS), AF long...

In cerebral small vessel disease (cSVD), whole brain MRI markers of cSVD-related brain injury explain limited variance to support individualized prediction. Here, we investigate whether considering abnormalities in brain tracts by integrating multimodal metrics from diffusion MRI (dMRI) and structural MRI (sMRI), can better capture cognitive perfor...

Attention is a core cognitive function that lters and selects behaviourally relevant information in the environment. The cortical mapping of attentional systems identi ed two segregated networks that mediate stimulus-driven and goal-driven processes, the Ventral and the Dorsal Attention Networks (VAN, DAN). Deep brain electrophysiological recording...

The present study aimed to investigate the role of connectivity disruptions in two fiber pathways, the uncinate fasciculus (UF) and the frontal aslant tract (FAT), in developmental dyslexia and determine the relationship between the connectivity of these pathways and behavioral performance in children with dyslexia. A total of 26 French children wi...

It has been suggested that developmental dyslexia may have two dissociable causes—a phonological deficit and a visual attention span (VAS) deficit. Yet, neural evidence for such a dissociation is still lacking. This study adopted a data‐driven approach to white matter network analysis to explore hubs and hub‐related networks corresponding to VAS an...

Patients with semantic aphasia have impaired control of semantic retrieval, often accompanied by executive dysfunction following left hemisphere stroke. Many but not all of these patients have damage to the left inferior frontal gyrus, important for semantic and cognitive control. Yet semantic and cognitive control networks are highly distributed,...

Inconsistent findings have been reported about the impact of structural disconnections on language function in post-stroke aphasia. This study investigated patterns of structural disconnections associated with chronic language impairments using disconnectome maps. Seventy-six individuals with post-stroke aphasia underwent a battery of language asse...

Background and purpose: Sequalae following stroke represents a significant challenge in current rehabilitation. The location and size of focal lesions are only moderately predictive of the diverse cognitive outcome after stroke. One explanation building on recent work on brain networks proposes that the cognitive consequences of focal lesions are...

The critical brain hypothesis states that biological neuronal networks, because of their structural and functional architecture, work near phase transitions for optimal response to internal and external inputs. Criticality thus provides optimal function and behavioral capabilities. We test this hypothesis by examining the influence of brain injury...

Background and objectives: Connectivity-based approaches incorporating the distribution and magnitude of the extended brain network aberrations caused by lesions may offer higher sensitivity for axonal damage in patients with multiple sclerosis (MS) than conventional lesion characteristics. Using individual brain disconnectome mapping, we tested t...

In cerebral small vessel disease (cSVD), whole brain MRI markers of cSVD-related brain injury explain limited variance to support individualized prediction. Here, we investigate whether considering abnormalities in brain tracts by integrating multimodal metrics from diffusion MRI (dMRI) and structural MRI (sMRI), can better capture cognitive perfor...

Brain size significantly impacts the organization of white matter fibers. Fiber length scaling - the degree to which fiber length varies according to brain size - was overlooked. We investigated how fiber lengths within the corpus callosum, the most prominent white matter tract, vary according to brain size. The results showed substantial variation...

Cognitive functional neuroimaging has been around for over 30 years and has shed light on the brain areas relevant for reading. However, new methodological developments enable mapping the interaction between functional imaging and the underlying white matter networks. In this study, we used such a novel method, called the disconnectome, to decode t...

Cognitive functional neuroimaging has been around for over 30 years and has shed light on the brain areas relevant for reading. However, new methodological developments enable mapping the interaction between functional imaging and the underlying white matter networks. In this study, we used such a novel method, called the disconnectome, to decode t...

Over the past two decades, the study of resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) has revealed the existence of multiple brain areas displaying synchronous functional blood oxygen level-dependent signals (BOLD)-resting-state networks (RSNs). The variation in functional connectivity between the different areas of a resting-state net...

Stroke significantly impacts quality of life. However, the long-term cognitive evolution in stroke is poorly predictable at the individual level. There is an urgent need for a better prediction of long-term symptoms based on acute clinical neuroimaging data. Previous works have demonstrated a strong relationship between the location of white matter...

Motricity is the most commonly affected ability after a stroke. While many clinical studies attempt to predict motor symptoms at different chronic time points after a stroke, longitudinal acute-to-chronic studies remain scarce. Taking advantage of recent advances in mapping brain disconnections, we predict motor outcomes in 62 patients assessed lon...

Patients with semantic aphasia have impaired control of semantic retrieval, often accompanied by executive dysfunction following left hemisphere stroke. Many but not all of these patients have damage to the left inferior frontal gyrus, important for semantic and cognitive control. Yet semantic and cognitive control networks are highly distributed,...

The field of neurocognition is currently undergoing a significant change of perspective. Traditional neurocognitive models evolved into an integrative and dynamic vision of cognitive functioning. Dynamic integration assumes an interaction between cognitive domains traditionally considered to be distinct. Language and declarative memory are regarded...

Motricity is the most commonly affected ability after a stroke. While many clinical studies attempt to predict motor symptoms at different chronic time points after a stroke, longitudinal acute-to-chronic studies remain scarce. Taking advantage of recent advances in mapping brain disconnections, we predict motor outcomes in 62 patients assessed lon...

Cortical asymmetry is a ubiquitous feature of brain organization that is altered in neurodevelopmental disorders, yet we lack knowledge of how its development proceeds across life in health. Achieving consensus on cortical asymmetries in humans is necessary to uncover the genetic-developmental mechanisms that shape them and factors moderating corti...

Since Roger Sperry’s Nobel Prize (1981; see also Sperry 1974) for his discoveries of the functional specialisation of the cerebral hemispheres, significant theoretical and methodological advances have improved the quantitative characterisation of functional and structural markers of brain asymmetries. For instance, we now know that this is the disp...

Lesion network mapping estimates functional network abnormalities caused by a focal brain lesion. The method requires embedding the volume of the lesion into a normative functional connectome and using the average functional magnetic resonance imaging signal from that volume to compute the temporal correlation with all other brain locations. Lesion...

Patients with semantic aphasia have impaired control of semantic retrieval, often accompanied by executive dysfunction, following left hemisphere stroke. Many but not all of these patients have damage to left inferior frontal gyrus, important for semantic and cognitive control. Yet semantic and cognitive control networks are highly distributed, inc...

Inter-individual differences can inform treatment procedures and—if accounted for—have the potential to significantly improve patient outcomes. However, when studying brain anatomy, these inter-individual variations are commonly unaccounted for, despite reports of differences in gross anatomical features, cross-sectional, and connectional anatomy....

Recent resting-state functional MRI studies in stroke patients have identified two robust biomarkers of acute brain dysfunction: a reduction of inter-hemispheric functional connectivity between homotopic regions of the same network, and an abnormal increase of ipsi-lesional functional connectivity between task-negative and task-positive resting-sta...

The field of neurocognition is currently undergoing a significant change of perspective. Traditional neurocognitive models evolved into an integrative and dynamic vision of cognitive functioning. Dynamic integration assumes an interaction between cognitive domains traditionally considered to be distinct. Language and declarative memory are regarded...

In recent years, the field of functional neuroimaging has moved away from a pure localisationist approach of isolated functional brain regions to a more integrated view of these regions within functional networks. However, the methods used to investigate functional networks rely on local signals in grey matter and are limited in identifying anatomi...

Inter-individual differences can inform treatment procedures and - if accounted for - can improve patient outcomes. However, when studying brain anatomy, these variations are largely unaccounted for. Brain connections are essential to mediate brain functional organization and, when severed, cause functional impairments. Here we reviewed the wealth...

Cognitive theories have been proposed to clarify the causes and symptoms of dyslexia. However, correlations between local network parameters of white matter connectivity and literacy skills remain poorly known. An unbiased hypothesis-free approach was adopted to examine the correlations between literacy symptoms (reading and spelling) and hub-based...

Sequalae following stroke represents a significant challenge in rehabilitation treatment. The location and size of focal lesions are only moderately predictive of the diverse cognitive outcome and rehabilitation potential after stroke. One explanation building on recent work on brain networks proposes that the cognitive consequences of focal lesion...

There is substantial experimental evidence for dysregulation of several microRNA (miRNA) expression levels in Alzheimer’s disease (AD). MiRNAs modulate critical brain intracellular signaling pathways and are associated with AD core pathophysiological mechanisms. First, we conducted a real-time quantitative PCR-based pilot study to identify a set of...

The pathophysiological mechanisms for classical plaque characteristics and their predictive value for clinical course and outcome in multiple sclerosis is unclear. Connectivity-based approaches incorporating the distribution and magnitude of the extended brain network aberrations caused by lesions may offer higher sensitivity for axonal damage. Usi...

Brain size significantly impacts the organization of white matter fibers. Fiber length scaling – the degree to which fiber length varies according to brain size – was overlooked. We investigated how fiber lengths within the corpus callosum, the most prominent white matter tract, vary according to brain size. The results showed substantial variation...

Objective Knowing explicitly where we are is an interpretation of our spatial representations. Reduplicative paramnesia is a disrupting syndrome in which patients present a firm belief of spatial mislocation. Here, we studied the largest sample of patients with delusional misidentifications of space (i.e. reduplicative paramnesia) after stroke to s...