(Press-News.org) Residing in a psychosocially hazardous neighborhood is associated with worse cognitive function in older age for persons with the apolipoprotein E ε4 allele (an alternative form of the gene), according to a report in the March issue of Archives of General Psychiatry, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.
"A prominent genetic factor of relevance to cognitive decline is the ε4 variant of the apolipoprotein E (APOE) gene, a strong predictor of increased risk and earlier onset of Alzheimer disease," the authors write as background information in the article. Apolipoprotein E is critical for basic neurological processes relevant to non-demented neurological health. "In the present article, we tested the hypothesis that living in psychosocially hazardous neighborhood environments may interact with APOE genotype to influence cognitive function."
Brian K. Lee, Ph.D., of Drexel University School of Public Health, Philadelphia, and colleagues analyzed data from the Baltimore Memory Study on 1,124 urban residents between 50 and 70 years of age to assess the association between living in a psychosocially hazardous neighborhood and cognitive function in aging. Patients were mostly white (53.8 percent) or African American (41.5 percent), and resided in any of the 63 Baltimore neighborhoods included in the study. Psychosocially hazardous neighborhoods are defined as areas that "give rise to a heightened state of vigilance, alarm, or fear in residents that may lead to a biological stress response."
Overall, 30.4 percent of participants possessed at least one ε4 allele, however the presence of the APOE ε4 differed by race/ethnicity, with 37.3 percent of African Americans ε4 positive compared with 24.7 percent of non-African Americans.
Before adjustment for outside factors (such as race, sex, wealth, etc.), participants living in the most psychosocially hazardous neighborhoods performed substantially worse in all seven cognitive domains tested (language, processing speed, eye-hand coordination, executive functioning, verbal memory and learning, visual memory, and visuoconstruction). In adjusted analysis with both neighborhood and APOE terms, persons living in the most psychosocially hazardous neighborhoods scored lower only on eye-hand coordination than other participants. APOE ε4 was associated with worse performance in executive function and visuoconstruction (ability to organize and manually manipulate spatial information, usually in the reproduction of geometric figures).
Compared with persons negative for APOE ε4 allele in less psychosocially hazardous neighborhoods, those who are negative for the allele and were living in the most psychosocially hazardous neighborhoods did not perform worse in any of the tested domains, nor did persons positive for APOE ε4 who were living in less psychosocially hazardous neighborhoods. However, persons positive for APOE ε4 living in the most psychosocially hazardous neighborhoods performed significantly worse than all three groups in processing speed, eye-hand coordination, executive functioning and visuoconstruction.
"Our findings provide evidence that among persons with the APOE ε4 allele, cognitive performance in processing speed and executive function was significantly worse for persons residing in neighborhoods with higher levels of psychosocial hazards, with additional suggestive evidence for eye-hand coordination," the authors conclude. Additionally, "for genetically vulnerable persons, a psychosocially hazardous neighborhood environment may be detrimental for cognitive function in aging."
###
(Arch Gen Psychiatry. 2011;68[3]:314-321. Available pre-embargo to the media at www.jamamedia.org.)
Editor's Note: This study was supported by grants from the National Institutes of Health and the Johns Hopkins Bayview Medical Center General Clinical Research Center. Please see the article for additional information, including other authors, author contributions and affiliations, financial disclosures, funding and support, etc.
To contact Brian K. Lee, Ph.D., call Rich Ochab at 215-762-4732 or e-mail rso25@drexel.edu.
For more information, contact JAMA/Archives Media Relations at 312/464-JAMA (5262) or e-mail mediarelations@jama-archives.org.
END
COLUMBUS, Ohio – An analysis conducted by Ohio State University cancer researchers has found that adding the targeted therapy bevacizumab to the treatment of patients with advanced ovarian cancer is not cost effective.
The findings comparing the relative value of various clinical strategies will be published online March 7 in the Journal of Clinical Oncology.
The researchers performed a cost-effectiveness analysis looking at a clinical trial conducted by the Gynecologic Oncology Group (GOG) studying the use of bevacizumab along with standard chemotherapy for patients ...
UPTON, NY — A study conducted at the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) Brookhaven National Laboratory demonstrated that drug addicted individuals who have a certain genetic makeup have lower gray matter density – and therefore fewer neurons – in areas of the brain that are essential for decision-making, self-control, and learning and memory.
Nelly Alia-Klein, a study coauthor who is a Brookhaven Lab medical scientist, said, "This research shows that genes can influence the severity of addiction. The results suggest that addicted individuals with low MAOA [monoamine oxidase ...
Glaucoma is the second-most common cause of blindness in the US, and occurs due to loss of retinal ganglion cells and degeneration of the optic nerve. Although it is known that high levels of pressure within the eye predispose individuals to the development of glaucoma, the molecular mechanisms involved are poorly defined.
In new research from The Jackson Laboratory in Bar Harbor, Maine, Simon John and colleagues analyzed gene expression patterns in the retina and optic nerves of mice that develop age-related glaucoma. Using a method that involved the clustering of ...
HOUSTON, March 7, 2011 – Cleaning up pollution, protecting soil from erosion and maintaining species-rich ecosystems are some of the goals of a computational ecology project by a University of Houston (UH) scientist and his team. Published recently in a top journal, the work sheds light on a new method to speed up research in the ecology of plants.
Marc Garbey, a professor of computer science and mathematics at UH, and his fellow researchers describe these findings in a paper titled "Large scale parameter study of an individual-based model of clonal plant with volunteer ...
Burkitt's lymphoma is one of the most aggressive tumors affecting humans. Multiple alterations in genes that regulate cell proliferation rate explain its aggressive behavior.
A new study reveals new molecular insight into the understanding and treatment of Burkitt`s lymphoma. The new finding concentrates on a genetic locus -- a piece of DNA with one or more genes which is the specific location of a gene or DNA sequence on a chromosome -- called INK4a/ARF locus. This locus encodes two important tumor suppressor genes, p16 and p14, and is usually inactivated in human tumors ...
Increased export of Brazilian beef indirectly leads to deforestation in the Amazon. New research from Chalmers and SIK that was recently published in Environmental Science & Technology shows that impact on the climate is much greater than current estimates indicate. The researchers are now demanding that indirect effect on land be included when determining a product's carbon footprint.
"If this aspect is not taken into consideration, there is a risk of the wrong signals being sent to policy makers and consumers, and we become guilty of underestimating the impact Brazilian ...
LA JOLLA, Calif., March 7, 2011 – In the past few months, a slew of papers have indicated that the therapeutic potential of a promising type of stem cell, called induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells, might be limited by reprogramming errors and genomic instability. iPS cells are engineered by reprogramming fully differentiated adult cells, often skin cells, back to a primitive, embryonic-like state. Given these problems, a team of researchers at Sanford-Burnham Medical Research Institute (Sanford-Burnham), Chung-Ang University in Korea, the University of British Columbia, ...
During embryonic development, sensory and motor fibers interact to form nerves in the limbs. The research team led by Dr. Andrea Huber Brösamle of the Institute of Developmental Genetics of Helmholtz Zentrum München has now elucidated how this interaction functions at the molecular level: The cell surface receptor neuropilin-1 is present in both sensory and motor nerve fibers and controls their interaction in order to correctly regulate growth.
"We observed that motor and sensory axons were both able to guide and lead the formation of the spinal nerves of the arms and ...
"Many people are now saying: 'Is it really that easy? Then why didn't anyone think of it a long time ago?' But you have to have the right idea at the right time," says Annette Röttger, physicist at the Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt (PTB), in a pleased way. Annette Röttger and her scientific team managed to do something that was previously thought to be impossible: they developed a primary standard for the measurement of short-lived radioactive thoron. Thoron measuring instruments from all over the world will now be calibrated at this unique device which is currently ...
Poor diet during pregnancy increases offspring's vulnerability to the effects of aging, new research has shown for the first time.
The research, by scientists from the University of Cambridge, provides important insight into why children born to mothers who consumed an unhealthy diet during pregnancy have an increased risk of type 2 diabetes (a significant contributing factor to heart disease and cancer) later in life.
"What is most exciting about these findings is that we are now starting to really understand how nutrition during the first nine months of life ...
