ArticleNeuroImage2019
Prenatal lead exposure impacts cross-hemispheric and long-range connectivity in the human fetal brain.
Article in NeuroImage, 2019. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 50 papers.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
50 citing papers in PubMed, 94 citations in OpenAlex.
- Associations between chronic placental inflammation, fetal brain development and later autism traits.Brain, behavior, & immunity - health · 2026Article
- Functional brain connectivity from the fetal period through infancy: A narrative review of resting-state fMRI studies.Developmental cognitive neuroscience · 2026Review
- Prenatal neural network organization and later executive function development.Developmental cognitive neuroscience · 2026Article
- Fetal functional connectivity prospectively associates with autistic traits in toddlerhood.NeuroImage. Clinical · 2026Article
- Human brain R2* transitions across birth from the womb to early infancy.Communications biology · 2025Article
- Social Determinants of Health and Early Brain Development.Pediatric clinics of North America · 2025Review
- Prenatal brain connectivity and postnatal language: how familial risk and prenatal speech exposure shape early language skills.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- Environmental adversity, endoplasmic reticulum stress, and neurogenesis.Neurotoxicology · 2025Review
- Early-Life Lead Exposure and Male Longevity: Evidence from Historical Municipal Water Systems.Explorations in economic history · 2025Article
- The role of the gut microbiome in the associations between lead exposure and child neurodevelopment.Toxicology letters · 2025Review
- Evaluating the effects of volume censoring on fetal functional connectivity.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- Assessment of Essential and Toxic Element Levels in the Toenails of Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder.Biological trace element research · 2025Article
- Mitofilin-mtDNA Axis Mediates Chronic Lead Exposure-Induced Synaptic Plasticity Impairment of Hippocampal and Cognitive Deficits.Biomolecules · 2025Article
- Trajectories of human brain functional connectome maturation across the birth transition.PLoS biology · 2024Article
- Greater Neighborhood Disadvantage Is Associated with Alterations in Fetal Functional Brain Network Structure.The Journal of pediatrics · 2024Observational
- Advances in fetal and neonatal neuroimaging and everyday exposures.Pediatric research · 2024Review
- Functional connectivity of the pediatric brain.Neuroradiology · 2024Review
- Exposure to Endocrine Disruptors in Early life and Neuroimaging Findings in Childhood and Adolescence: a Scoping Review.Current environmental health reports · 2024Article
- Advances in Fetal Brain Imaging.Magnetic resonance imaging clinics of North America · 2024Review
- Characterizing Large-Scale Human Circuit Development with In Vivo Neuroimaging.Cold Spring Harbor perspectives in biology · 2024Review
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
8 authors at 4 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
Lead represents a highly prevalent metal toxicant with potential to alter human biology in lasting ways. A population segment that is particularly vulnerable to the negative consequences of lead exposure is the human fetus, as exposure events occurring before birth are linked to varied and long-ranging negative health and behavioral outcomes. An area that has yet to be addressed is the potential that lead exposure during pregnancy alters brain development even before an individual is born. Here, we combine prenatal lead exposure information extracted from newborn bloodspots with the human fetal brain functional MRI data to assess whether neural network connectivity differs between lead-exposed and lead-naïve fetuses. We found that neural connectivity patterns differed in lead-exposed and comparison groups such that fetuses that were not exposed demonstrated stronger age-related increases in cross-hemispheric connectivity, while the lead-exposed group demonstrated stronger age-related increases in posterior cingulate cortex (PCC) to lateral prefrontal cortex (PFC) connectivity. These are the first results to demonstrate metal toxicant-related alterations in human fetal neural connectivity. Remarkably, the findings point to alterations in systems that support higher-order cognitive and regulatory functions. Objectives for future work are to replicate these results in larger samples and to test the possibility that these alterations may account for significant variation in future child cognitive and behavioral outcomes.
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What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.