The premature brain: imaging, anatomy and uncertain outcome

The saying goes that a child is not a small adult, and certainly an infant is not (only) a small child; a neonate is not an infant, and a fetus is still more different. So what is a premature neonate? At 24 weeks, the brain volume is less than a third of what it would be at term. The interconnection of the cortex with the rest of the gray matter of the central nervous system is only beginning; instead, transient structures like the subplate play the role of a primordial cortex by connecting to both out-going and in-coming axons, before acting as a cortical template by guiding them to their final targets during the last trimester.