State-of-the art brain-imaging technology distinguishes between normal age-related memory loss and Alzheimer’s disease, new research suggests.
Brain scans taken while a study’s participants performed object-based memory tests suggest Alzheimer’s sufferers have a loss of signalling in the region of the brain known as the anterolateral entorhinal cortex.
Such signalling losses do not occur in people suffering normal age-related memory decline, such as forgetting where they left their keys or someone’s name, a study found today.
Previous research suggests the anterolateral entorhinal cortex mediates communication between the region of the brain where information is first encoded and where it is stored long term.
Past studies also imply this cortex is one of the first regions in the brain to develop protein plaque tangles, which are associated with dementia’s onset.
Alzheimer’s disease affects around 5.5 million people in the US and 850,000 in the UK. Most sufferers live just eight-to-10 years after their diagnosis.
The yellow section in the young brain indicates significant activity in the region that mediates communication between where information is first encoded and where it is stored long term. Such activity is absent in the older brain, which may suggest Alzheimer’s disease
‘The brain ageing process is selective’
Speaking of the results, study author Dr Michael Yassa, from the University of California, Irvine, said: ‘These findings suggest that the brain ageing process is selective.
‘Our findings are not a reflection of general brain ageing, but rather specific neural changes that are linked to specific problems in object memory.’
Alzheimer’s-related memory loss affects objects more than locations, the research adds.
Lead author Zachariah Reagh, who now works at the University of California, Davis, said: ‘This suggests that not all memory changes equally with ageing.
‘Object memory is far more vulnerable than spatial memory, at least in the early stages.’
The researchers plan to conduct a similar study on 150 older adults to determine if such scans could accurately diagnose Alzheimer’s disease.
Dr Yassa added: ‘We hope this comprehensive imaging and cognitive testing will enable us to figure out whether the deficits we saw in the current study are indicative of what is later to come in some of these individuals.’
The findings were published in the journal Neuron.
How the research was carried out
The researchers analysed 20 young adults, aged between 18 and 31, as well as 20 healthy older people, who were 64-to-89.
All of the participants were asked to perform both an object and location memory task while standing in a body-length MRI scanner.
The scanner measures blood flow in the brain, which allows researchers to determine which part of the organ people are using.
In the first task, the participants memorised pictures of everyday objects and then distinguished them from new pictures.
The second assignment required the participants to determine whether objects changed their location.
Dr Yassa said: ‘Some of the pictures were identical to ones they’ve seen before, some were brand new and others were similar to what they’ve seen before – we may change the colour or the size.
‘We call these tricky items the “lures”.’
Scans taken while people perform object-based memory tests suggest Alzheimer’s disease sufferers have a loss of signalling in a specific region of the brain (stock)
Alzheimer’s will be as manageable as HIV within 10 years
This comes after Nobel Prize-winning scientists predicted earlier this month Alzheimer’s will be as manageable as HIV within 10 years.
Future dementia treatments will be taken before the condition develops to prevent symptoms rather than attempting to reverse them, according to Professor Michel Goedert, who was involved in discovering the importance of protein plaques in Alzheimer’s onset.
Professor Goedert, from the University of Cambridge, added: ‘Alzheimer’s will become something like HIV.
‘It’s still there but it has been contained or whittled down by drug treatments.
‘It will disappear as a major problem from society.’
Professor Goedert believes drugs under investigation for Alzheimer’s often fail due to them being taken too late into the disease’s progression.
His colleague Professor Bart De Strooper of University College London, with whom he shares the four-million euro Nobel-Prize money, added: ‘The mistakes we have made is the trials is that treatment has been given too late.
‘It’s like popping a statin to stop a heart attack.
‘But when we first started we knew almost nothing about Alzhiemer’s and now we understand a huge amount.
‘In 10 years we will have a completely different picture.’