Umeå Cognitive Science Seminar bjuder in till ett seminarium med Nina Karalija, Umeå universitet. Seminariet ges på engelska och har den engelska titeln "Aging-related dopamine decline - a risk factor of cognitive decline and dementia pathology?".
This presentation will address two critical questions: (1) Does aging-related dopamine decline in the brain constitute a risk factor of cognitive decline and dementia pathology? (2) How can the dopamine system be spared in aging? I will present findings from Umeå-based brain imaging studies in which healthy older adults underwent positron emission tomography and magnetic resonance imaging to study dopamine integrity and brain structure and function. Cognitive performance was evaluated via tests of episodic memory, working memory, and perceptual speed. Alzheimer’s disease pathology is quantified via plasma-based biomarkers. Longitudinal analyses showed that most individuals underwent significant dopaminergic decline over time, but some were spared of such losses. Such individual differences in dopaminergic losses were found to be meaningful for cognitive changes. Ongoing work focuses on the intersection of dopamine decline and Alzheimer’s disease (AD) pathology, and specifically, whether exacerbated dopamine losses earlier in aging may serve as a risk factor of later amyloid beta and p-tau build-up. Our research further highlights cerebral-small vessel disease and glia cell reactivity as two factors behind dopaminergic losses in aging.
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