AI Article Synopsis

  • Dopamine loss is linked to cognitive deficits in aging, with higher brain signal variability tied to better cognitive performance in younger adults.
  • Researchers investigated how adult age, dopamine availability, and BOLD signal variability interact during a spatial working memory task.
  • Findings reveal that neocortical BOLD variability is negatively affected by age but positively associated with task performance, while variability in subcortical regions relates to age and slower responses, highlighting the role of DA in cognitive function.

Article Abstract

Dopamine (DA) losses are associated with various aging-related cognitive deficits. Typically, higher moment-to-moment brain signal variability in large-scale patterns of voxels in neocortical regions is linked to better cognitive performance and younger adult age, yet the physiological mechanisms regulating brain signal variability are unknown. We explored the relationship among adult age, DA availability, and blood oxygen level-dependent (BOLD) signal variability, while younger and older participants performed a spatial working memory (SWM) task. We quantified striatal and extrastriatal DA D1 receptor density with [(11)C]SCH23390 and positron emission tomography in all participants. We found that BOLD variability in a neocortical region was negatively related to age and positively related to SWM performance. In contrast, BOLD variability in subcortical regions and bilateral hippocampus was positively related to age and slower responses, and negatively related to D1 density in caudate and dorsolateral prefrontal cortex. Furthermore, BOLD variability in neocortical regions was positively associated with task-related disengagement of the default-mode network, a network whose activation needs to be suppressed for efficient SWM processing. Our results show that age-related DA losses contribute to changes in brain signal variability in subcortical regions and suggest a potential mechanism, by which neocortical BOLD variability supports cognitive performance.

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http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/cercor/bhv029DOI Listing

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