Abstract
Population aging has become a serious social problem. Accordingly, many researches are focusing on changes in brains of the elderly. In this study, we used multiple parameters to analyze age-related changes in white matter fibers. A sample cohort of 58 individuals was divided into young and middle-age groups and tract-based spatial statistics (TBSS) were used to analyze the differences in fractional anisotropy (FA), mean diffusion (MD), axial diffusion (AD), and radial diffusion (RD) between the two groups. Deterministic fiber tracking was used to investigate the correlation between fiber number and fiber length with age. The TBSS analysis revealed significant differences in FA, MD, AD, and RD in multiple white matter fibers between the two groups. In the middle-age group FA and AD were lower than in young people, whereas the MD and RD values were higher. Deterministic fiber tracking showed that the fiber length of some fibers correlated positively with age. These fibers were observed in the splenium of corpus callosum (SCC), the posterior limb of internal capsule (PLIC), the right posterior corona radiata (PCR_R), the anterior corona radiata (ACR), the left posterior thalamic radiation (include optic radiation; PTR_L), and the left superior longitudinal fasciculus (SLF_L), among others. The results showed that the SCC, PLIC, PCR_R, ACR, PTR_L, and SLF_L significantly differed between young and middle-age people. Therefore, we believe that these fibers could be used as image markers of age-related white matter changes.
Highlights
Nowadays, population aging has become an international trend
We performed a voxelwise comparison of fractional anisotropy (FA), mean diffusion (MD), axial diffusion (AD), and radial diffusion (RD) values displaying age related difference between the two cohorts
We found that the FA and AD values in GCC, BCC, and splenium of corpus callosum (SCC) regions of middle-age people were lower than that of young people, while the RD value of middle-age people was significantly higher than that of young people
Summary
Population aging has become an international trend. In 2009, the world entered the age of aging (United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, 2011). Histopathological evidence has shown that the degeneration of white matter is an important sign of aging (Marner et al, 2003; Bartzokis, 2004). Age-correlated studies reveal that the changes in white matter may be much higher than those of gray matter (Miller et al, 1980). Upto 40 years of age, the white matter volume increases and is closely related to the formation of the myelin sheath (Courchesne et al, 2000; Bartzokis, 2004). With myelin sheath and axon degeneration, the integrity of the white matter changes to varying degrees, with white matter function declining and brain parenchymal structure undergoing atrophy (Bartzokis et al, 2001; Raz et al, 2005; Hedman et al, 2012). In Alzheimer’s disease white matter volume is much higher than in healthy elderly people (Semendeferi et al, 2002), while the integrity of white matter is lower (Mayo et al, 2018)
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