ArticleLife (Basel, Switzerland)2023
The Unresolved Methodological Challenge of Detecting Neuroplastic Changes in Astronauts.
Article in Life (Basel, Switzerland), 2023. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 8 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
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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.
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Who cites it
8 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 13 citations in OpenAlex.
- Effect of spaceflight experience on human brain structure, microstructure, and function: systematic review of neuroimaging studies.Brain imaging and behavior · 2024Pooled it
- Brain displacement and nonlinear deformation following human spaceflight.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2026Article
- Hippocampal Volumetric Changes in Astronauts Following a Mission in the International Space Station.NeuroSci · 2025Article
- Brains in space: impact of microgravity and cosmic radiation on the CNS during space exploration.Nature reviews. Neuroscience · 2025Review
- Spaceflight Associated Neuro-ocular Syndrome (SANS) and its countermeasures.Progress in retinal and eye research · 2025Review
- Long-term effects of simulated microgravity in the central nervous system of rhesus monkeys: a voxel-wise multimodal MRI study.Frontiers in physiology · 2025Article
- Toward an Etiology of Spaceflight Neuroplastic Syndrome: Evolutionary Science Leads to New Hypotheses and Program Priorities.NeuroSci · 2023Article
- Neurocognitive Adaptations for Spatial Orientation and Navigation in Astronauts.Brain sciences · 2023Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
6 authors at 2 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
After completing a spaceflight, astronauts display a salient upward shift in the position of the brain within the skull, accompanied by a redistribution of cerebrospinal fluid. Magnetic resonance imaging studies have also reported local changes in brain volume following a spaceflight, which have been cautiously interpreted as a neuroplastic response to spaceflight. Here, we provide evidence that the grey matter volume changes seen in astronauts following spaceflight are contaminated by preprocessing errors exacerbated by the upwards shift of the brain within the skull. While it is expected that an astronaut's brain undergoes some neuroplastic adaptations during spaceflight, our findings suggest that the brain volume changes detected using standard processing pipelines for neuroimaging analyses could be contaminated by errors in identifying different tissue types (i.e., tissue segmentation). These errors may undermine the interpretation of such analyses as direct evidence of neuroplastic adaptation, and novel or alternate preprocessing or experimental paradigms are needed in order to resolve this important issue in space health research.
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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.