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Published in: Brain Structure and Function 3/2021

01-04-2021 | Positron Emission Tomography | Original Article

Role of dopamine and gray matter density in aging effects and individual differences of functional connectomes

Authors: Benjamín Garzón, Martin Lövdén, Lieke de Boer, Jan Axelsson, Katrine Riklund, Lars Bäckman, Lars Nyberg, Marc Guitart-Masip

Published in: Brain Structure and Function | Issue 3/2021

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Abstract

With increasing age, functional connectomes become dissimilar across normal individuals, reflecting heterogenous aging effects on functional connectivity (FC). We investigated the distribution of these effects across the connectome and their relationship with age-related differences in dopamine (DA) D1 receptor availability and gray matter density (GMD). With this aim, we determined aging effects on mean and interindividual variance of FC using fMRI in 30 younger and 30 older healthy subjects and mapped the contribution of each connection to the patterns of age-related similarity loss. Aging effects on mean FC accounted mainly for the dissimilarity between connectomes of younger and older adults, and were related, across brain regions, to aging effects on DA D1 receptor availability. Aging effects on the variance of FC indicated a global increase in variance with advancing age, explained connectome dissimilarity among older subjects and were related to aging effects on variance of GMD. The relationship between aging and the similarity of connectomes can thus be partly explained by age differences in DA modulation and gray matter structure.
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Metadata
Title
Role of dopamine and gray matter density in aging effects and individual differences of functional connectomes
Authors
Benjamín Garzón
Martin Lövdén
Lieke de Boer
Jan Axelsson
Katrine Riklund
Lars Bäckman
Lars Nyberg
Marc Guitart-Masip
Publication date
01-04-2021
Publisher
Springer Berlin Heidelberg
Published in
Brain Structure and Function / Issue 3/2021
Print ISSN: 1863-2653
Electronic ISSN: 1863-2661
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1007/s00429-020-02205-4

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