Secrets of 'SuperAger' brains
Elderly SuperAgers have brains that look and act decades younger than their age
2012-08-17
(Press-News.org) CHICAGO --- Researchers have long chronicled what goes wrong in the brains of older people with dementia. But Northwestern Medicine researcher Emily Rogalski wondered what goes right in the brains of the elderly who still have terrific memories. And, do those people – call them cognitive SuperAgers --- even exist?
Rogalski's new study has for the first time identified an elite group of elderly people age 80 and older whose memories are as sharp as people 20 to 30 years younger than them. And on 3-D MRI scans, the SuperAger participants' brains appear as young -– and one brain region was even bigger –- than the brains of the middle-aged participants.
She was astounded by the vitality of the SuperAgers' cortex – the outer layer of the brain important for memory, attention and other thinking abilities. Theirs was much thicker than the cortex of the normal group of elderly 80 and older (whose showed significant thinning) and closely resembled the cortex size of participants ages 50 to 65, considered the middle-aged group of the study.
"These findings are remarkable given the fact that grey matter or brain cell loss is a common part of normal aging," said Rogalski, the principal investigator of the study and an assistant research professor at the Cognitive Neurology and Alzheimer's Disease Center at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine.
Rogalski is senior author of the paper, which is published in the Journal of the International Neuropsychological Society.
By identifying older people who seem to be uniquely protected from the deterioration of memory and atrophy of brain cells that accompanies aging, Rogalski hopes to unlock the secrets of their youthful brains. Those discoveries may be applied to protect others from memory loss or even Alzheimer's disease.
"By looking at a really healthy older brain, we can start to deduce how SuperAgers are able to maintain their good memory," Rogalski said. "Many scientists study what's wrong with the brain, but maybe we can ultimately help Alzheimer's patients by figuring out what goes right in the brain of SuperAgers. What we learn from these healthy brains may inform our strategies for improving quality of life for the elderly and for combatting Alzheimer's disease."
By measuring the thickness of the cortex – the outer layer of the brain where neurons (brain cells) reside – Rogalski has a sense of how many brain cells are left.
"We can't actually count them, but the thickness of the outer cortex of the brain provides an indirect measure of the health of the brain," she said. "A thicker cortex, suggests a greater number of neurons."
In another region deep in the brain, the anterior cingulate of SuperAger participants' was actually thicker than in the 50 to 65 year olds.
"This is pretty incredible," Rogalski said. "This region is important for attention. Attention supports memory. Perhaps the SuperAgers have really keen attention and that supports their exceptional memories."
Only 10 percent of the people who "thought they had outstanding memories" met the criteria for the study. To be defined as a SuperAger, the participants needed to score at or above the norm of the 50 to 65 year olds on memory screenings.
"These are a special group of people," Rogalski said. They aren't growing on trees."
For the study, Rogalski viewed the MRI scans of 12 Chicago-area Superager participants' brains and screened their memory and other cognitive abilities. The study included 10 normally aging elderly participants who were an average age of 83.1 and 14 middle-aged participants who were an average age of 57.9. There were not significant differences in education among the groups.
Most of the SuperAger participants plan to donate their brains to the study. "By studying their brains we can link the attributes of the living person to the underlying cellular features," Rogalski said.
INFORMATION:
Northwestern co-authors on the study include Marsel Mesulam, M.D., Sandra Weintraub and Theresa Harrison, formerly with Northwestern and now a graduate student at UCLA.
This project was supported by a grant from The Davee Foundation and grants AG13854,
P30 299 AG010129 and K01 AG030514 from the National Institute on Aging of the National Institutes of Health.
NORTHWESTERN NEWS: www.northwestern.edu/newscenter/
END
ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:
2012-08-17
BUFFALO, N.Y. – An international survey of tobacco use in three billion individuals, published in the current issue of The Lancet, demonstrates an urgent need for policy change in low- and middle-income countries, according to the University at Buffalo professor who led the research.
"Governments around the world need to start giving economic and regulatory advantages to agricultural products that promote health instead of to products like tobacco that kill people," says lead author Gary A. Giovino, PhD, chair of the Department of Community Health and Health Behavior ...
2012-08-17
When it comes to protecting endangered species, the power of the people is key, an analysis of listings under the U.S. Endangered Species Act finds.
The journal Science is publishing the analysis comparing listings of "endangered" and "threatened" species initiated by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the agency that administers the Endangered Species Act, to those initiated by citizen petition.
"We found that citizens, on average, do a better job of picking species that are threatened than does the Fish and Wildlife Service. That's a really interesting and surprising ...
2012-08-17
Scientists at the University of Liverpool have identified a type of E. coli bacteria that may encourage the development of colon cancer.
The Liverpool team had previously shown that people with colon cancer and with the inflammatory bowel diseases, Crohn's disease and ulcerative colitis, have high numbers of a sticky type of E. coli in their colons.
The team have now found that E. coli bacteria, which carry pks genes that encode a toxin that damages DNA in the cells of the gut lining, are more commonly found in the colons of patients that have inflammatory bowel disease ...
2012-08-17
While the health benefits of breast feeding baby are well known, a new study published in BioMed Central's open access journal BMC Pediatrics finds that, for very low birth weight (VLBW) babies, a small amount of fortification can improve growth rates without sacrificing the benefits associated with mother's milk.
Human milk provides babies with exactly the right nutrients for growth and also helps protect against infections and diseases. Breast fed babies are less likely to have diarrhea or vomiting, they have fewer chest and ear infections, and long term are less likely ...
2012-08-17
Treatment for cervical disease does not appear to increase the risk of subsequently giving birth prematurely, according to a study of over 44,000 women in England. The study, published online in the British Medical Journal [1] today (Friday), is the largest in the UK to investigate this and contradicts previous research suggesting treatment could be linked to an increased risk.
Professor Peter Sasieni, professor of cancer epidemiology and biostatistics at the Wolfson Institute of Preventive Medicine, part of Queen Mary, University of London (UK), led the study. "This ...
2012-08-17
A team of researchers led by George Whitesides, the Woodford L. and Ann A. Flowers University Professor, has already broken new engineering ground with the development of soft, silicone-based robots inspired by creatures like starfish and squid.
Now, they're working to give those robots the ability to disguise themselves.
As demonstrated in an August 16 paper published in Science, researchers have developed a system – again, inspired by nature – that allows the soft robots to either camouflage themselves against a background, or to make bold color displays. Such a ...
2012-08-17
The 2012 Marine Climate Change in Australia Report Card shows climate change is having significant impacts on Australia's marine ecosystems.
The report card provides information about the current and predicted-future state of Australia's marine climate and its impact on our marine biodiversity. The report card also outlines actions that are underway to help our marine ecosystems adapt to climate change.
"Australia has some of the world's most unique marine ecosystems," project leader CSIRO's Dr Elvira Poloczanska said.
"They are enjoyed recreationally, generate considerable ...
2012-08-17
Earthworms could be used to extract toxic heavy metals, including cadmium and lead, from solid waste from domestic refuse collection and waste from vegetable and flower markets, according to researchers writing in the International Journal of Environment and Waste Management.
Swati Pattnaik and M. Vikram Reddy of the Department of Ecology and Environmental Sciences, at Pondicherry University, in Puducherry, India, explain how three species of earthworm, Eudrilus eugeniae, Eisenia fetida and Perionyx excavates can be used to assist in the composting of urban waste and ...
2012-08-17
Researchers have found what they believe is the key to understanding why the human brain is larger and more complex than that of other animals.
The human brain, with its unequaled cognitive capacity, evolved rapidly and dramatically.
"We wanted to know why," says James Sikela, PhD, who headed the international research team that included researchers from the University of Colorado School of Medicine, Baylor College of Medicine and the National Institutes of Mental Health. "The size and cognitive capacity of the human brain sets us apart. But how did that happen?"
"This ...
2012-08-17
Fast-growing retail medical clinics are attracting more older patients and delivering more preventive care, particularly flu shots and other vaccinations, according to a new study from the RAND Corporation.
Researchers found that visits to retail medical clinics increased four-fold from 2007 to 2009, with the proportion of patients over age 65 growing from 8 percent to 19 percent of all visits during this period.
More than 44 percent of visits to the clinics occurred on the weekend or other hours when physician offices typically are closed, suggesting retail clinics ...
LAST 30 PRESS RELEASES:
[Press-News.org] Secrets of 'SuperAger' brains
Elderly SuperAgers have brains that look and act decades younger than their age
