QTIM (ds004169)
Queensland Twin IMaging (QTIM)
Brain MRI of 1,202 twins and siblings from Queensland aged 12 to 30, with T1w, n-back and resting-state fMRI and diffusion scans on a 4 T scanner, a test-retest and a longitudinal subsample, in BIDS on OpenNeuro under CC0.
Overview
The Queensland Twin IMaging study scanned twins and their non-twin siblings in Queensland to measure how strongly genes shape brain structure, function and connectivity. The study was run by QIMR Berghofer and the University of Queensland. The data were released on OpenNeuro as ds004169 in 2022 under a CC0 waiver, with diffusion scans of the young adults added in snapshot 1.0.8 (July 2026). It suits heritability, test-retest and normative studies of the young brain.
Composition
Snapshot 1.0.8 holds 1,202 participants from 682 families (732 female, 470 male), aged 12 to 30 at the first scan. According to the dataset README, 1,026 are young adults aged 18 to 30; the others are adolescents scanned at about 12 or 16 years. Every participant has a T1-weighted scan, 1,195 have n-back and/or resting-state fMRI and 697 have diffusion imaging. A second session exists for 141 participants. The participants table flags 78 young adults rescanned after about 3.5 months for test-retest reliability and 62 adolescents rescanned about four years later. Derivatives include FreeSurfer 5.3 measures, hippocampal subfield volumes and MRIQC and DSI Studio quality metrics.
Acquisition
All scans come from one 4 T Bruker Medspec whole-body scanner; the image headers list Siemens as manufacturer. The T1w image is a 3D MPRAGE at 0.9 mm isotropic resolution. Resting-state fMRI uses gradient-echo EPI with a 2.1 s TR. The diffusion protocol of the young adults used 94 gradient directions at b = 1159 s/mm² plus 11 b0 images. Faces were removed from the T1w images, and the data are organized in BIDS.
Annotations
There are no image annotations. The participants table lists age, sex, handedness, a family identifier, the T1w orientation per session, the n-back timing version and the test-retest or longitudinal group.
Known limitations
- Zygosity and other phenotypes are not in the open release. They need a data transfer agreement and ethics approval.
- A scanner software upgrade changed the T1w protocol mid-study from coronal to sagittal acquisition with fewer slices. A vascular pulsation artefact varies with that orientation.
- The first five n-back volumes precede the task and should be dropped; adolescents at 12 years had two n-back stimulus timings.
- Twins and siblings are not independent samples; the family identifier must be used in any split.
- All participants are right-handed, and the sample is about 61% female.
Cohort
Aggregate numbers from the sources below. Bars are relative to the 1,202 subjects.
Sex
- Female 732 61%
- Male 470 39%
Age
mean 21.2± 4 · range 12 to 30Age by sex
Reported cross table. Missing cells were not published (fewer than 10 subjects or not reported).
- 55220-29326
- 17910-19144
Contrast combinations
How many subjects have exactly each set of contrasts.
| T1w | dwi | bold | Subjects with exactly this set |
|---|---|---|---|
696 | |||
499 | |||
6 | |||
1 |
Contrast / sequence
subjects, values can overlap
- T1-weighted 1,202 100%
- BOLD fMRI 1,195 99%
- Diffusion-weighted 697 58%
Field strength
subjects
- 4 T 1,202 100%
License and access
Our reading of the license, not legal advice. Before you use the data, read the original license and confirm that your use is allowed. We take no responsibility for how you use a dataset. Full disclaimer
Download without an account
Creative Commons Zero 1.0 Universal
Public domain dedication. Do anything with the data, including commercial use, without asking and without having to give credit.
dataset_description.json of snapshot 1.0.8 states "License" CC0. Zygosity and further phenotypes are not part of the release and need a data transfer agreement and ethics approval from QIMR Berghofer.
What you can do
- Yes
- Yes
- Yes
- Yes
What you can share
- Yes
- Yes
- Yes
What you must do
- No
- Share alike No
- No
- No
- Manuscript review No
- Release code No
- Return results No
- Delete after use No
Limits
- No
- Location limits No
Citation
Strike LT, Blokland GAM, Hansell NK, Martin NG, Toga AW, Thompson PM, de Zubicaray GI, McMahon KL, Wright MJ. Queensland Twin IMaging (QTIM). OpenNeuro ds004169 (2022). doi:10.18112/openneuro.ds004169. The dataset asks to also cite Strike et al. 2019 (T1w), Blokland et al. 2011 (n-back), Sinclair et al. 2015 (rest) and Shen et al. 2014 (diffusion).
All numbers
Every number on this page, as stored in stats.csv, with its source.
| Measure | Breakdown | Value | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Subjects | total 1202 rows; the OpenNeuro snapshot summary also lists 1202 subjects and the file tree has 1202 subject folders | 1,202 | ds004169-participants |
| Subjects | sex=female sex F | 732 | ds004169-participants sex |
| Subjects | sex=male sex M | 470 | ds004169-participants sex |
| Subjects | age=10-19 age in years rounded down at session 1 | 323 | ds004169-participants age |
| Subjects | age=20-29 age in years rounded down at session 1 | 878 | ds004169-participants age |
| Subjects | age=30-39 age 30 at session 1 | 1 | ds004169-participants age |
| Subjects | sex=female;age=10-19 | 179 | ds004169-participants sex, age |
| Subjects | sex=male;age=10-19 | 144 | ds004169-participants sex, age |
| Subjects | sex=female;age=20-29 | 552 | ds004169-participants sex, age |
| Subjects | sex=male;age=20-29 | 326 | ds004169-participants sex, age |
| Subjects | contrast=T1w | 1,202 | ds004169-file-tree anat/*_T1w.nii.gz |
| Subjects | contrast=bold n-back and/or resting-state runs | 1,195 | ds004169-file-tree func/*_bold.nii.gz |
| Subjects | contrast=dwi | 697 | ds004169-file-tree dwi/*_dwi.nii.gz |
| Subjects | contrast_set=bold+dwi+T1w | 696 | ds004169-file-tree |
| Subjects | contrast_set=bold+T1w | 499 | ds004169-file-tree |
| Subjects | contrast_set=T1w | 6 | ds004169-file-tree |
| Subjects | contrast_set=dwi+T1w | 1 | ds004169-file-tree |
| Studies | total 141 subjects have two sessions | 1,343 | ds004169-file-tree ses-* folders with NIfTI files |
| Scans | total sum of the disjoint T1w, bold and dwi image counts; deface masks not counted | 4,540 | ds004169-file-tree *_T1w/_bold/_dwi.nii.gz |
| Scans | contrast=T1w | 1,342 | ds004169-file-tree anat/*_T1w.nii.gz |
| Scans | contrast=bold 1311 n-back and 1142 resting-state runs | 2,453 | ds004169-file-tree func/*_bold.nii.gz |
| Scans | contrast=dwi | 745 | ds004169-file-tree dwi/*_dwi.nii.gz |
| Subjects | field_strength=4 all 4540 imaging sidecars give 3.95 T | 1,202 | ds004169-file-tree MagneticFieldStrength in the JSON sidecars |
| Mean age | total age at session 1 | 21.2 | ds004169-participants age |
| Age SD | total | 4 | ds004169-participants age |
| Median age | total | 21 | ds004169-participants age |
| Minimum age | total | 12 | ds004169-participants age |
| Maximum age | total | 30 | ds004169-participants age |
Sources
The keys used in the table above.
- openneuro-ds004169-v108 OpenNeuro ds004169 snapshot 1.0.8 (README, dataset_description.json, snapshot summary) website
- ds004169-participants participants.tsv of ds004169 snapshot 1.0.8 (CC0), counted per row from the sex and age columns computed
- ds004169-file-tree File tree of ds004169 snapshot 1.0.8 (CC0), NIfTI files counted per subject, session and BIDS suffix computed
- sinclair2015 Sinclair et al. 2015, Heritability of the network architecture of intrinsic brain functional connectivity, NeuroImage paper
- shen2014 Shen et al. 2014, Investigating brain connectivity heritability in a twin study using diffusion imaging data, NeuroImage paper