WASHINGTON — Pregnancy triggers vast changes in a woman's body — hormonal, cardiovascular, respiratory, gastrointestinal, urinary and more. And, as a new study reveals, the brain undergoes major changes too, some fleeting and others more enduring.

Researchers said on Monday (Sept 16) they have for the first time mapped the changes that unfold as a woman's brain reorganises in response to pregnancy, based on scans carried out 26 times starting three weeks before conception, through nine months of pregnancy and then two years postpartum.

The study documented a widespread decrease in the volume of cortical grey matter, the wrinkled area that comprises the brain's outermost layer, as well as an increase in the microstructural integrity of white matter located deeper in the brain. Both changes coincided with rising levels of the hormones oestradiol and progesterone.

Grey matter is comprised of the cell bodies of the brain nerve cells. White matter is made up of the bundles of axons — long, thin fibres — of the nerve cells that transmit signals in long-distance connections across the brain.

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