VENturing into machine learning for the morphological analysis of von Economo neurons.

ABSTRACT: Von Economo neurons (VENs) are a specialized type of large, highly elongated projection neurons located in specific cortical regions. Despite their implication in higher-order cognitive functions and psychiatric disorders in humans, consistent and objective identification criteria for VENs remain lacking. We analyzed 761 digitally reconstructed neurons from the NeuroMorpho.Org database. We applied six supervised machine learning algorithms and a convolutional neural network with Grad-CAM visualization to classify the reconstructions into VENs and pyramidal neurons. Variable importance was evaluated using information-driven and expert-based selection. We compared the classifications made by machine learning algorithms to the reconstructions' original labels. Reconstructions misclassified by

SUBMITTER: Banovac I 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12749959 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature