Search for correlations between serotonin 5-HT1A receptor expression and cognitive functions—a strategy in translational psychopharmacology

Abstract

Animal studies and studies of human aging have suggested that the serotonin 5-HT1A receptor may serve as a biomarker for cognitive functioning and a target for pharmacological treatment of cognitive deficits. The purpose of this positron emission tomography (PET) study was to search for relationships between interindividual variability in serotonin 5-HT1A receptor binding potential (BP) and cognitive functioning. Twenty-four male control subjects, age 20-55 years, were examined with [11C]WAY100635 PET and a battery of cognitive tests. 5-HT1A receptor binding potential were calculated for the raphe nuclei, the hippocampus and the neocortex. Correlation coefficients between BP and cognitive performance were obtained for each region. There was a severalfold of variability in 5-HT1A BP between individuals. We found no significant correlation between regional [11C]WAY100635 binding and cognitive performance. The results do not provide support for involvement of the 5-HT1A receptor in cognitive functioning in man and question the predictive validity of some currently used animal models in translational neuroscience.