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Open Imaging Index
MRI Brain

SALD

Southwest University Adult Lifespan Dataset

Structural and resting-state brain MRI of healthy Chinese adults across adulthood, collected to chart brain ageing in a non-Western sample and to replicate ageing findings. 494 people aged 19 to 80 from Chongqing, shared openly in BIDS.

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Overview

The Southwest University Adult Lifespan Dataset (SALD) is a cross-sectional sample of healthy adults covering ages 19 to 80, collected by Jiang Qiu's group at the Brain Imaging Center of Southwest University in Chongqing, China, between 2010 and 2015. It was released through the International Neuroimaging Data-sharing Initiative (INDI) and described in a Scientific Data paper in 2018. Its purpose is to chart how brain structure and resting-state function change across adulthood in a non-Western sample and to give an independent set for replicating ageing findings.

Composition

The release holds 494 participants. Every participant has a T1-weighted anatomical image, and 493 of them also have an eight-minute resting-state fMRI run. Young adults were drawn from the university's student body, many middle-aged participants from its staff and the rest from nearby communities, so women in their twenties are overrepresented. A spreadsheet gives age, sex and Edinburgh handedness scores plus quality measures from the Preprocessed Connectomes Project QA protocol for each scan. Data are in BIDS on a public S3 bucket and as ten compressed archives of about 23.5 GB in total.

Acquisition

All scans come from one 3 T Siemens Trio. The sagittal MPRAGE has 176 slices of 1 mm isotropic voxels, TR 1900 ms, TE 2.52 ms and TI 900 ms. The resting-state run has 242 gradient-echo EPI volumes of 32 axial slices, TR 2000 ms, TE 30 ms and 3.4 x 3.4 mm in-plane voxels. Participants kept their eyes closed. Anatomical images were defaced with pydeface.

Annotations

There are no image labels. Phenotypes are limited to age, sex and handedness, with automated QA metrics.

Known limitations

  • Single site and single scanner, so it offers no scanner variability.
  • The age and sex distribution is uneven: few participants in their thirties and only one above 79.
  • The paper gives 308 females and 187 males, one more than the 494 participants. The released spreadsheet lists 307 females.
  • The paper reports a 90 degree flip angle for the MPRAGE, while the scanner protocol sheet on the release page shows 9 degrees.
  • All scans were released regardless of quality. Users choose their own exclusion criteria from the QA metrics.
  • Task fMRI was acquired for subgroups but is not part of the release.

Cohort

Aggregate numbers from the sources below. Bars are relative to the 494 subjects.

Sex

  • Female 307 62%
  • Male 187 38%

column Sex in sub_information.xlsx phenotype file (CC BY-NC per the release page), sheet "demographic information"

Contrast / sequence

Groups can overlap

  • T1-weighted 494 100%
  • BOLD fMRI 493 100%

columns Sub_ID and T1Img, columns Sub_ID and FunImg in sub_information.xlsx phenotype file (CC BY-NC per the release page), sheet "demographic information"

Scanner vendor

  • Siemens Healthineers 494 100%

Methods: Image Acquisitions in Wei et al. 2018, Structural and functional brain scans from the cross-sectional Southwest University adult lifespan dataset, Scientific Data

Country

  • China 494 100%

Abstract in Wei et al. 2018, Structural and functional brain scans from the cross-sectional Southwest University adult lifespan dataset, Scientific Data

Age

mean 45.2 ± 17.4, median 48, range 19 to 80

0
50
100
147
10-1920-2930-3940-4950-5960-6970-7980-89

column Age in sub_information.xlsx phenotype file (CC BY-NC per the release page), sheet "demographic information"; Methods: Participants in Wei et al. 2018, Structural and functional brain scans from the cross-sectional Southwest University adult lifespan dataset, Scientific Data

Condition

Groups can overlap

  • Healthy control 494 100%

Abstract in Wei et al. 2018, Structural and functional brain scans from the cross-sectional Southwest University adult lifespan dataset, Scientific Data

Field strength

  • 3 T 494 100%

Methods: Image Acquisitions in Wei et al. 2018, Structural and functional brain scans from the cross-sectional Southwest University adult lifespan dataset, Scientific Data

Age by sex

Reported cross table. Missing cells were not published (fewer than 10 or not reported).

Female Male
  • 26
    70-79
    15
  • 43
    60-69
    35
  • 72
    50-59
    40
  • 48
    40-49
    21
  • 22
    30-39
    20
  • 92
    20-29
    55

columns Sex and Age in sub_information.xlsx phenotype file (CC BY-NC per the release page), sheet "demographic information"

Contrast combinations

How many subjects have exactly each set of contrasts.

T1wboldSubjects with exactly this set
493
1

columns FunImg and T1Img in sub_information.xlsx phenotype file (CC BY-NC per the release page), sheet "demographic information"

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

Access
Open download

Download without an account

Access page

1000 Functional Connectomes Project / INDI terms (Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial, no version stated)

Non-commercial use only, after registering with the 1000 Functional Connectomes Project on NITRC. The NITRC project lists a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial license without a version: derived works must credit the source and stay non-commercial but need not use the same license.

The release page states "Creative Commons License: Attribution - Non-Commercial" as its usage agreement. The images and the phenotype file download from the public fcp-indi S3 bucket without an account. The data descriptor asks users to cite it.

Original license text Version read: License field "Attribution Non-Commercial" on the NITRC fcon_1000 project page (no Creative Commons version named) and the access statement on the INDI home page, read 2026-10-08 Checked 2026-10-08

What you can do

  • No
  • Not stated
  • Not stated
  • Conditional
  • Not stated

What you can share

  • Not stated
  • Conditional
  • Share trained models Not stated

What you must do

  • Yes
  • No
  • Conditional
  • Ethics approval No
  • Manuscript review No
  • Release code No
  • Return results No
  • Delete after use No

Limits

  • No
  • Location limits No

Commercial license: Not stated

Citation

Wei D, Zhuang K, Ai L, Chen Q, Yang W, Liu W, Wang K, Sun J, Qiu J. Structural and functional brain scans from the cross-sectional Southwest University adult lifespan dataset. Scientific Data 5, 180134 (2018). doi:10.1038/sdata.2018.134

Sources

Every number on this page comes from one of these documents. Each chart names the table or page it is taken from. The raw numbers are in stats.csv.