Relationship Between Sulcal Characteristics and Brain Aging.

Kaide Jin,Marnie Shaw,Nicolas Cherbuin,Perminder Sachdev,Tianqi Zhang

doi:10.3389/fnagi.2018.00339

Kaide Jin, Marnie Shaw + Show 3 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.3389/fnagi.2018.00339

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Abstract

This study aimed to determine whether sulcal morphology differs between middle age (MA) and older healthy individuals. Furthermore, we sought to determine whether age-related differences in sulcal characteristics were more strongly associated with differences in local or global cortical volumes. Participants (age 44–50, N = 403; age 64–70, N = 390) from the Personality and Total Health Through Life (PATH) study were included. Sulci were 17.3% wider, on average, in old age (OA) compared to MA participants, with the largest difference in the left superior frontal sulcus. Differences in sulcal width were generally higher in males than females. Differences in the width of the superior frontal and central sulci were significantly associated with differences in the volume of adjacent local gyri, while age-related differences in the width of lateral and superior temporal sulci were associated with differences in whole brain cortical volume. These findings suggest that sulcal characteristics provide unique information about changes in local and global brain structure in aging.

Highlights

Biological aging is associated with brain atrophy at both the micro and macroscopic scales (Esiri, 2007)
The aim of this study is to address these questions by: (1) investigating how sulcal morphology differs between middle adulthood and old-age (OA); (2) determining whether the volume of local brain structures or the whole brain are more strongly associated with sulcal characteristics; and (3) investigating whether sulcal width or depth is more strongly associated with local brain volumetric differences
This study produced four main findings. In this large populationbased cohort: (1) sulci were wider in older participants in all five sulci investigated; (2) sulcal depth was significantly shallower in older participants in the intra-parietal sulcus; (3) local factors (LF) were generally more predictive of sulcal morphology than global factors (GF); and (4) sulcal width was generally more strongly associated with local brain volumetric differences

Summary

Introduction

Biological aging is associated with brain atrophy at both the micro and macroscopic scales (Esiri, 2007). At the macroscopic level, neuroimaging studies show that volumetric decreases occur across the whole brain with some regions more affected than others (DeCarli et al, 2005; Fotenos et al, 2005). Volumetric studies have been very effective in using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) data to characterize localized patterns of cerebral atrophy across the lifespan. As MRI intensity contrast between gray matter (GM) and white matter (WM) decreases with age, estimates of cerebral atrophy tend to underestimate the actual rate of shrinkage (Kochunov et al, 2005; Lemaitre et al, 2012). Volumetric measures are not very sensitive to complicated brain surface folding and may introduce regional bias and decrease statistical power (Lemaitre et al, 2012)

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