Decreases in regional cerebral blood flow with normal aging
Abstract
Positron emission tomographic (PET) images of regional cerebral blood flow (rCBF) from 30 normal, resting volunteers aged 30 to 85 years were analysed to identify areas where rCBF fell with age. Images were anatomically normalised, and a pixel-by-pixel linear regression was performed to remove differences in global CBF between subjects. Pixels at which rCBF then showed a significant (p less than 0.01) negative correlation with age were identified. They were displayed as a statistical parametric map (SPM) of correlations. We demonstrate an age-related decrease in adjusted rCBF in the cingulate, parahippocampal, superior temporal, medial frontal, and posterior parietal cortices bilaterally, and in the left insular and left posterior prefrontal cortices (omnibus significance, chi 2 = 2,291, p less than 0.0001, df = 1). Decreases in rCBF suggest a regionally specific loss of cerebral function with age. The affected areas were all limbic, or association, cortices. Therefore, these decreases may constitute the cerebral substrate of the cognitive changes that occur during normal aging.
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Regional cerebral blood flow is a suboptimal marker of synaptic activity because perfusion can be affected by many physiological variables.
“Regional cerebral blood flow (rCBF) has been used as a marker of synaptic activity [12,42,44,48], but this is suboptimal, as perfusion can be affected by many physiological variables.”
From Voxel-based mapping of brain gray matter volume and glucose metabolism profiles in normal aging (2009) · cites this paper as [42]
Most previous studies have reported decreased activity in frontal areas and the anterior cingulate gyrus with age.
“Most previous studies have reported decreased activity in frontal areas and the anterior cingulate gyrus with age, using SPECT [44], [ 15 O]H2O-PET [5,12,42,48,54] or 18 FDG-PET [28,32,49,58,86,87,89].”
From Voxel-based mapping of brain gray matter volume and glucose metabolism profiles in normal aging (2009) · cites this paper as [42]
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- Authors
- Martin, A. J., Friston, K. J., Colebatch, J. G., & Frackowiak, R. S. J.
- Affiliations
- St Bartholomew's Hospital (GB)
- Hammersmith Hospital (GB)
- Venue
- Journal of Cerebral Blood Flow & Metabolism
- Publisher
- SAGE Publications
- Published
- 1991-07
- Volume
- 11
- Issue
- 4
- Pages
- 684-689
- ISSN
- 0271-678X (ISSN-L)
- 1559-7016
- OpenAlex
- W2089390439
- Cited by
- 393
- References
- 28
- Citations by year
- 2026: 3 · 2025: 3 · 2024: 7 · 2023: 13 · 2022: 7 · 2021: 13 · 2020: 8 · 2019: 21 · 2018: 19 · 2017: 9 · 2016: 17 · 2015: 14 · 2014: 4 · 2013: 12 · 2012: 10
- FWCI
- 7.85
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Journal of Cerebral Blood Flow & Metabolism (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- UCL Discovery (University College London) (submittedVersion)
- Funders
- Wellcome Trust
- Topics
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Psychiatry and Mental health › Dementia and Cognitive Impairment Research
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Functional Brain Connectivity Studies
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Radiology, Nuclear Medicine and Imaging › Advanced MRI Techniques and Applications
- Keywords
- regional cerebral blood flow, normal aging, age-related decline, cingulate cortex, parahippocampal cortex, superior temporal cortex, medial frontal cortex, posterior parietal cortex, insula, limbic cortex, association cortex, cognitive aging
- MeSH terms
- Adult, Aged, Aged, 80 and over, Aging, Blood Flow Velocity, Cerebrovascular Circulation, Female, Frontal Lobe, Gyrus Cinguli, Hippocampus, Humans, Male, Middle Aged, Parietal Lobe, Temporal Lobe, Tomography, Emission-Computed
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