Network neuroscience and the connectomics revolution

TL;DR

This paper reviews how network neuroscience and connectomics provide a quantitative framework for understanding brain structure and function, emphasizing the importance of network architecture in cognition, disease, and development.

Contribution

It offers a comprehensive overview of human connectomics at the macroscale, including data acquisition, analysis methods, and emerging research frontiers.

Findings

Network architecture influences cognitive processes.

Diffusion and functional MRI are key tools in connectomics.

Emerging frontiers include multimodal integration and dynamic network analysis.

Abstract

Connectomics and network neuroscience offer quantitative scientific frameworks for modeling and analyzing networks of structurally and functionally interacting neurons, neuronal populations, and macroscopic brain areas. This shift in perspective and emphasis on distributed brain function has provided fundamental insight into the role played by the brain's network architecture in cognition, disease, development, and aging. In this chapter, we review the core concepts of human connectomics at the macroscale. From the construction of networks using functional and diffusion MRI data, to their subsequent analysis using methods from network neuroscience, this review highlights key findings, commonly-used methodologies, and discusses several emerging frontiers in connectomics.