Fig. 1. The blood flow organization in cortical microvessel networks induces broadly distributed flow rates and vessel transit times.

a Simulated blood flow map in a microvascular network feeding 1 mm³ of the mouse cortex (see Supplementary Figure S1a, b and Supplementary Movie S1). Vessel flow rates are represented with blue shades for Q < Q_c and red shades for Q > Q_c (see also Supplementary Figure S1c, d, f and Supplementary Movie S2). b PDF of simulated flow rates (black dots) compared with the approximation of Eq. (1) (continuous blue line). The characteristic flow rate Q_c separating the uniform and power-law regimes are indicated as a dotted line. Inset: PDF of vessel transit times. The diffusion coefficients for oxygen and amyloid-β ($D_{O_2}$ = 2 × 10⁻⁹ m² s⁻¹ and D_Aβ = 6 × 10⁻¹¹ m² s⁻¹) yield diffusion times ($t_D^{O_2}$ and $t_D^{A\beta }$) indicated by the green and red dashed lines, respectively. c Example of trajectories visiting <30 vessels (orange) and >70 vessels (blue), originating from the arteriole shown by the arrow (see Supplementary Figure S2a–d and Supplementary Movies S3).