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Perinatal human cerebellum development: high-resolution in-vivo and ex-vivo imaging

Award Number: R01HD121977
ORGANIZATION: NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF CHILD HEALTH AND HUMAN DEVELOPMENT
OPDIV: NIH
AWARD CLASS: DISCRETIONARY
AWARD ACTIVITY TYPE: SCIENTIFIC/HEALTH RESEARCH (INCLUDES SURVEYS)
PERIOD OF PERFORMANCE START DATE: 06/23/2026
PERIOD OF PERFORMANCE END DATE: 03/31/2031

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Perinatal human cerebellum development: high-resolution in-vivo and ex-vivo imaging - PROJECT SUMMARY The human cerebellum undergoes substantial development during the first postnatal year. Due to advances in neonatal imaging, perinatal cerebellar injury has been increasingly detected in prematurely born infants up to 19%, and the number is even higher in very low birth weight preterm. The consequences of cerebellar injury are complex, involving developmental delays in motor, language, cognition, and social behaviors. The impact appears in the first two years of life and continues into school age and adolescence. Numerous studies have reported a link between neuroimaging findings in neonatal cerebellar abnormalities and subsequent functional disorders. However, the results are inconclusive, especially in the cases of secondary cerebellum injury, where massive cerebellar lesions are absent. How the trajectory of structural development contributes to the functional domains remains to be elucidated. Notably, the role of connective pathways has been largely neglected in disorders. There is no consensus on evaluating cerebellar development in clinical practice. This problem is primarily due to the limitation of in vivo imaging techniques, which hinders the development of interventional strategies and targeted therapy that may mediate the developmental delay at an early age. To close this gap, this project proposes to map the neuroarchitecture and connectivity development of the human cerebellum within the first year of postnatal life by leveraging a cross-scale imaging framework. The framework builds upon the preliminary work of longstanding in vivo infant neuroimaging tool development and ex vivo magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and polarization-sensitive optical coherence tomography (PS-OCT) to reveal the human cerebellum's microscopic structure and fiber pathways. We aim to build high resolution structural and connectivity atlases from publicly available infant MRI cohorts as well as ultrahigh-resolution structural and connectivity atlases using 20 postmortem infant samples to characterize neurodevelopment of the cerebellum. By comparing structure- and connectivity-dependent growth curves in healthy control and preterm infant with or without cerebellar injury, we aim to identify biomarkers that can predict their developmental outcomes. Our ultimate goal is twofold: quantitative morphological characterization of the early stages of human cerebellar development and the improvement in the functional outcomes in preterm infants by enabling early intervention. Successful completion of the project will advance our knowledge of the underlying structural components supporting the functional domains in the human cerebellum. The high-resolution in vivo and ex vivo atlases will offer a valuable reference for future clinical evaluations in neurodevelopmental disorders involving the cerebellum.


Issue Date FY	Funding FY	Legal Entity Name	Legal Entity Address	Legal Entity City	Legal Entity State	Legal Entity Zip Code	Legal Entity COUNTY	Legal Entity COUNTRY	Assistance Listing	Award Code	Budget Year	Action Date	Action Type	Action Amount

Issue Date FY: 2026 ( Subtotal = $681,793 )
2026	2026	THE GENERAL HOSPITAL CORPORATION	55 FRUIT ST	BOSTON	MA	02114	SUFFOLK	USA	Child Health and Human Development Extramural Research	000	1	6/25/2026	NEW	$681,793
														Subtotal = $681,793

Grand Total All Awards = $681,793

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Perinatal human cerebellum development: high-resolution in-vivo and ex-vivo imaging

Award Number: R01HD121977

ORGANIZATION: NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF CHILD HEALTH AND HUMAN DEVELOPMENT

OPDIV: NIH

AWARD CLASS: DISCRETIONARY

AWARD ACTIVITY TYPE: SCIENTIFIC/HEALTH RESEARCH (INCLUDES SURVEYS)

PERIOD OF PERFORMANCE START DATE: 06/23/2026

PERIOD OF PERFORMANCE END DATE: 03/31/2031

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