Music in premature infants enhances high-level cognitive brain networks

Abstract

Neonatal intensive care units are willing to apply environmental enrichment via music for preterm newborns. However, no evidence of an effect of music on preterm brain development has been reported to date. Using resting-state fMRI, we characterized a circuitry of interest consisting of three network modules interconnected by the salience network that displays reduced network coupling in preterm compared with full-term newborns. Interestingly, preterm infants exposed to music in the neonatal intensive care units have significantly increased coupling between brain networks previously shown to be decreased in premature infants: the salience network with the superior frontal, auditory, and sensorimotor networks, and the salience network with the thalamus and precuneus networks. Therefore, music exposure leads to functional brain architectures that are more similar to those of full-term newborns, providing evidence for a beneficial effect of music on the preterm brain.

Keywords: brain function; music intervention; preterm newborns; resting-state fMRI; salience network.

Fig. 1.

COI. Edges represent lower functional connectivity between components in preterm controls than in full-term newborns. Node localization is based on the local maxima of the z-score within each network. Orange: module M1; blue: module M2, black: module M3. Sal, salience network; Aud, auditory cortex; Tha, thalamus; RpTG, right posterior temporal gyrus, Vis, visual cortex; LpTG, left posterior temporal gyrus.

Fig. 2.

Differences in fc between preterm music-exposed and preterm control infants. Bold edges represent significantly higher functional connectivity in the premature infants exposed to music (PM) than in premature control infants (PC) (FDR < 0.05). Orange: module M1; blue: module M2; and black: module M3. Left post TG, left posterior temporal gyrus; Right post TG, right posterior temporal gyrus.

Fig. 3.

Sixteen components obtained from the ICA. Each row shows a coronal, sagittal, and axial view of the components thresholded at a z-score > 3 superimposed on a T2-weighted MR infant brain template. The colored bars show the corresponding z-scores.