Brain charts for neuroanatomical sex differences across the human lifespan

Gardner, M.; Dorfschmidt, L.; Zimmerman, D.; Shanmugan, S.; Seidlitz, J.; Bethlehem, R.; Pritschet, L.; Lifespan Brain Chart Consortium,; Raznahan, A.; Shinohara, R.; Alexander-Bloch, A.

doi:10.64898/2026.05.09.724029

bioRxiv · 10.64898/2026.05.09.724029

Brain charts for neuroanatomical sex differences across the human lifespan

Gardner, M.·Dorfschmidt, L.·Zimmerman, D.·Shanmugan, S.·Seidlitz, J.·Bethlehem, R.·Pritschet, L.·Lifespan Brain Chart Consortium,·Raznahan, A.·Shinohara, R.·Alexander-Bloch, A.

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Abstract

Population-level sex differences in human neuroanatomy have been highly debated, with prior literature limited by narrow age windows and assumptions about regions scaling with total brain size. Building on recent work charting brain structures across the lifespan, we use magnetic resonance imaging data from over 100,000 individuals (51.7% F) to model normative reference trajectories of 241 structural features capturing age-varying sex effects. Results show replicable age-varying sex differences in nearly all features, and sexs effects survive nonlinear correction for total brain size, with sex biases tending to increase across the lifespan. Notably, models are sensitive to atypicalities in six neuropsychiatric disorders. This work establishes and quantifies population-level sex biases in the largest-to-date study of sex differences in the human brain.

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Gardner, M., Dorfschmidt, L., Zimmerman, D., Shanmugan, S., Seidlitz, J., Bethlehem, R., Pritschet, L., Lifespan Brain Chart Consortium,, Raznahan, A., Shinohara, R., Alexander-Bloch, A.. 2026-05-11. Brain charts for neuroanatomical sex differences across the human lifespan. https://doi.org/10.64898/2026.05.09.724029

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