Abstract
Objectives: This study was aimed to investigate the gender-related differences of regional cerebral glucose metabolism in healthy people along the age using 18F-FDG PET/CT.Methods: We recruited 344 healthy volunteers, including 217 males and 127 females (age range: 40–89 years old). All subjects underwent fluorine-18 fluorodeoxyglucose(18F-FDG) positron emission tomography (PET). All the data were divided into four groups for every 10 years old. Each participant was carefully screened from PET, MR, and other examinations in order to exclude the abnormalities, such as neurodegenerative or psychiatric disorders, alcohol/abuse, cerebral vascular disorders, metabolic diseases like diabetes mellitus and hyperthyroidism, and other systemic malignancies. The 40–50 years old group was set as the baseline group. Statistical parametric mapping (SPM) analysis was employed to illustrate the differences among groups.Results: Compared to the baseline group, whether in a cohort or different gender groups, the decrease of brain glucose metabolism was shown in the bilateral frontal lobe, anterior cingulate gyrus, and the bilateral temporal lobe. In males, the regions of decreased metabolism were bilateral frontal lobe, caudate nucleus, and cingulate gyrus, whereas that of females were left occipital lobe, cerebellum, and the thalamus. However, the overall decrease of brain metabolism in men and women began from the age of 60s, an aggravated decrease from 70s was only observed in males.Conclusion: (1) An obviously decreased brain metabolism was found from 60 years old, especially in the bilateral frontal lobe, bilateral temporal lobe, and inferior cingulate gyrus; (2) We found specific brain metabolic differences between genders, including the caudate nucleus region in males and the occipital lobe region in females; and (3) The aging trend is different between genders.
Highlights
Aging can lead to changes in brain function and structure, such as cognitive decline, which indicates dementia, disease, and death (Uchida et al, 2019)
We examined the cerebral glucose metabolism using FDG positron emission tomography (FDG PET)/CT in healthy subjects of different genders, and discussed the metabolic differences between sexes and the age-related brain aging
We found that the overall decrease of brain metabolism in men and women were all began from the age of 60s
Summary
Aging can lead to changes in brain function and structure, such as cognitive decline, which indicates dementia, disease, and death (Uchida et al, 2019). A study shows that brain aging may be the initial stage of neurodegeneration (Loewenstein et al, 2004). Another study shows that the pathological changes of familial AD in the brain seem to develop 25 years before clinical symptom onset (Florez, 2012). A robust feature of human biology is that women live longer than men in almost all countries (Austad and Bartke, 2015). In order to detect the preclinical stage of patients of different genders, it is necessary to catch a subtle abnormality that deviates from the healthy state. It is important to know the healthy brain morphology and activity beforehand, especially between different genders
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