Age dependence of primary motor cortex plasticity induced by paired associative stimulation

作者：Tecchio F^*; Zappasodi F; Pasqualetti P; De Gennaro L; Pellicelari M C; Ercolani M; Squitti R; Rossini P M

来源：Clinical Neurophysiology, 2008, 119(3): 675-682.

DOI：10.1016/j.clinph.2007.10.023

• paired associative stimulation (PAS)
• plasticity
• transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS)

Objective: The increase of elderly population prompted growing research for the understanding of cerebral phenomena sustaining learning abilities, with inclusion of long-term potentiation (LTP)-like plasticity phenomena. Aim of the present study was to characterize LTP-like plasticity dependence on age and gender.
Methods: A LTP-like primary motor cortex plasticity inducing a potentiation of the motor evoked potential (MEP) to focal transcranial magnetic stimulation as a consequence of a paired associative stimulation (PAS) was induced in a 50 healthy subject cohort, equally distributed for gender and age groups (25 young subjects, mean age +/- SD = 29.8 +/- 4.5 years; elderly 61.1 +/- 4.1 years).
Results: Resting motor thresholds' excitability level increased in the elderly group, the basal MEP did not depend on gender or age. The PAS-induced primary motor cortex (M1) plastic excitability modulation was similar in young females and males, while it decreased with age in females only.
Conclusions: A reduction of the PAS-induced M I plasticity in females after menopause was documented, possibly due to an impairment of intracortical excitatory network activity.
Significance: A LTP-like plasticity dependence on age was found in female only, suggesting caution in interpreting behavioural studies on learning abilities in dependence on age.

• 出版日期2008-3
• 单位中国人民解放军空军预警学院