ArticleProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America2022
Comparing human and chimpanzee temporal lobe neuroanatomy reveals modifications to human language hubs beyond the frontotemporal arcuate fasciculus.
Article in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 21 papers.
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21 citing papers in PubMed, 51 citations in OpenAlex.
- Convergent and Divergent Connectivity Patterns of the Arcuate Fasciculus in Macaques and Humans.Advanced science (Weinheim, Baden-Wurttemberg, Germany) · 2026Article
- Insights From Language-Trained Apes: Brain Network Plasticity and Communication.Evolutionary anthropology · 2025Review
- Evolutionary Convergence of the Arcuate Fasciculus in Marmosets and Humans.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2025Article
- Long arcuate fascicle in wild and captive chimpanzees as a potential structural precursor of the language network.Nature communications · 2025Article
- The Chimpanzee Brainnetome Atlas reveals distinct connectivity and gene expression profiles relative to humans.Innovation (Cambridge (Mass.)) · 2025Article
- From Multimodal Sensorimotor Integration to Semantic Networks: A Phylogenetic Perspective on Speech and Language Evolution.Neurobiology of language (Cambridge, Mass.) · 2025Review
- Investigating the role of the left inferior frontal gyrus in language evolution: insights from comparative neuroscience.Frontiers in human neuroscience · 2025Review
- Article
- Comparative Analysis of Human-Chimpanzee Divergence in Brain Connectivity and its Genetic Correlates.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2024Article
- Evolution of Glutamate Metabolism viaInternational journal of molecular sciences · 2024Review
- Why did humans surpass all other primates? Are our brains so different? Part 2.Dementia & neuropsychologia · 2024Review
- Why did humans surpass all other primates? Are our brains so different? Part 1.Dementia & neuropsychologia · 2024Review
- Connectivity of Fronto-Temporal Regions in Syntactic Structure Building During Speaking and Listening.Neurobiology of language (Cambridge, Mass.) · 2024Article
- The uniqueness of the human brain: a review.Dementia & neuropsychologia · 2024Review
- Structural connectivity of the multiple demand network in humans and comparison to the macaque brain.Cerebral cortex (New York, N.Y. : 1991) · 2023Article
- The relevance of the unique anatomy of the human prefrontal operculum to the emergence of speech.Communications biology · 2023Article
- Sulcal morphology of posteromedial cortex substantially differs between humans and chimpanzees.Communications biology · 2023Article
- Sulcal morphology of posteromedial cortex substantially differs between humans and chimpanzees.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2023Article
- Morphological Features of Human Dendritic Spines.Advances in neurobiology · 2023Review
- Human-to-monkey transfer learning identifies the frontal white matter as a key determinant for predicting monkey brain age.Frontiers in aging neuroscience · 2023Article
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Authors and funding
8 authors at 1 institution in 3 countries.
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Abstract
The biological foundation for the language-ready brain in the human lineage remains a debated subject. In humans, the arcuate fasciculus (AF) white matter and the posterior portions of the middle temporal gyrus are crucial for language. Compared with other primates, the human AF has been shown to dramatically extend into the posterior temporal lobe, which forms the basis of a number of models of the structural connectivity basis of language. Recent advances in both language research and comparative neuroimaging invite a reassessment of the anatomical differences in language streams between humans and our closest relatives. Here, we show that posterior temporal connectivity via the AF in humans compared with chimpanzees is expanded in terms of its connectivity not just to the ventral frontal cortex but also to the parietal cortex. At the same time, posterior temporal regions connect more strongly to the ventral white matter in chimpanzees as opposed to humans. This pattern is present in both brain hemispheres. Additionally, we show that the anterior temporal lobe harbors a combination of connections present in both species through the inferior fronto-occipital fascicle and human-unique expansions through the uncinate and middle and inferior longitudinal fascicles. These findings elucidate structural changes that are unique to humans and may underlie the anatomical foundations for full-fledged language capacity.
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