Decline in prefrontal catecholamine synthesis explains age-related changes in cognitive speed beyond regional grey matter atrophy

作者：Kalbitzer Jan^*; Deserno Lorenz; Schlagenhauf Florian; Beck Anne; Mell Thomas; Bahr Gerd; Buchholz Hans Georg; Plotkin Michail; Buchert Ralph; Kumakura Yoshitaka; Cumming Paul; Heinz Andreas; Rapp Michael A

来源：European Journal of Nuclear Medicine and Molecular Imaging, 2012, 39(9): 1462-1466.

DOI：10.1007/s00259-012-2162-4

• Ageing
• Biological parametric mapping
• Cognitive speed
• Dopamine

Age-related decline in cognitive speed has been associated with prefrontal dopamine D1 receptor availability, but the contribution of presynaptic dopamine and noradrenaline innervation to age-related changes in cognition is unknown. %26lt;br%26gt;In a group of 16 healthy participants aged 22-61 years, we used PET and the radioligand FDOPA to measure catecholamine synthesis capacity (K (in) (app); millilitres per gram per minute) and the digit symbol substitution test to measure cognitive speed, a component of fluid IQ. %26lt;br%26gt;Cognitive speed was associated with the magnitude of K (in) (app) in the prefrontal cortex (p %26lt; 0.0005). Both cognitive speed (p = 0.003) and FDOPA K (in) (app) (p %26lt; 0.0005) declined with age, both in a standard voxel-wise analysis and in a volume-of-interest analysis with partial volume correction, and the correlation between cognitive speed and K (in) (app) remained significant beyond the effects of age (p = 0.047). MR-based segmentation revealed that these age-related declines were not attributable to age-related alterations in grey matter density. %26lt;br%26gt;Our findings indicate that age-related changes in the capacity of the prefrontal cortex to synthesize catecholamines, irrespective of cortical atrophy, may underlie age-related decline in cognitive speed.

• 出版日期2012-9