Symmetric brain atlas template for newborns brain asymmetry studies

Abstract

Since the human brain has a certain degree of asymmetry, asymmetry analysis based on an asymmetric brain template may result in ambiguity. Therefore, in this paper we present our framework to create a symmetric brain template from a group of newborns aged between 39 to 42 weeks after gestation. Consequently, the resulting template shows no difference between its original and its flipped version as is the case for an asymmetric template. The resulting symmetric template can be used e.g. for brain asymmetry analysis in language development.