Overview
Some of the most urgent issues confronting the scientific community today involve mental health and the development of the human brain. Thus, the field of developmental neuroscience aims to uncover the developmental trajectory of the human brain and understand the changes that occur as a function of aging. Understanding the mechanisms of aging will help the scientific community move closer towards discovering the causes of nervous system diseases related to aging. Here, we describe the data generated in the Southwest University Adult Lifespan Dataset (SALD), which comprises a large cross-sectional sample (n = 494; age range = 19-80) undergoing a multi-modal (sMRI, rs-fMRI, and behavioral). The goals of the SALD are to give researchers the opportunity to map the structural and functional changes the human brain undergoes throughout adulthood and to replicate previous findings.
The dataset includes:
- One T1-Weighted MPRAGE anatomical scan
- One eight-minute resting state fMRI scan
- Basic phenotypic information (Age, sex, handedness) and qap measures for each subject
A more detailed description can be found in
Wei, D., Zhuang, K., Chen, Q., Yang, W., Liu, W., Wang, K., ... & Qiu, J. (2017). Structural and functional MRI from a cross-sectional Southwest University Adult lifespan Dataset (SALD). bioRxiv, 177279.
Experimental Protocol
Subjects were instructed to lie down, close their eyes, and rest without thinking about anything specific without falling asleep.
Data Release Download (S3)
Data for SALD are available for download in an Amazon Web Services S3 bucket in both uncompressed and compressed format, in the folders RawData_BIDS and RawData_tar, respectively.
Each file in the S3 bucket can only be accessed using HTTP (i.e., no ftp or scp ). You can obtain a URL for each desired file and then download it using an HTTP client such as a web browser, wget, or curl. Each file can only be accessed using its literal name - wildcards (i.e. "*") will not work.
There are file transfer programs that can handle S3 natively and will allow you to navigate through the data using a file browser. Cyberduck is one such program that works with Windows and Mac OS X. Cyberduck also has a command line version that works with Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux. Once "duck" is installed, run the followign command to downlaod the whole dataset in the folders.
duck --verbose -u anonymous --download s3://fcp-indi/data/Projects/INDI/SALD/RawData_BIDS/ ~/Downloads/
Instructions for using the Cyberduck program are as follows:
- Open Cyberduck and click on Open Connection.
- Set the application protocol in the dropdown menu to S3 (Amazon Simple Storage Service).
- Set the server to s3.amazonaws.com.
- Check the box labelled Anonymous Login.
- Expand the More Options tab and set Path to fcp-indi/data/Projects/INDI/SALD.
- Click Connect.
- SALD data are organized in both uncompressed and compressed format, in the folders RawData_BIDS and RawData_tar, respectively.

Data Release Download (Direct Download)
Subjects 031274-031323 | Subjects 031324-031373 |
Subjects 031374-031423 | Subjects 031424-031473 |
Subjects 031474-031523 | Subjects 031524-031573 |
Subjects 031574-031623 | Subjects 031624-031673 |
Subjects 031674-031723 | Subjects 031724-031767 |
Dataset Description |