Biomarkers of Abnormal Brain Aging

Overview

We are investigating early mechanisms of abnormal brain aging and validating biomarkers that stand to detect it before clinical symptoms appear.

Diseases of brain aging affect a substantial number of people and have a profoundly negative impact on patients and their families. The potential benefits of interventions that aim to slow the progression of neurological and neurodegenerative conditions are greatest at the earliest stages of disease, prior to the emergence of clinical symptoms. However, accurate detection at pre-symptomatic stages remains elusive. In our research, we explore multimodal approaches to identifying early mechanisms of abnormal brain aging and to the validation of early biomarkers of abnormal aging.

Keywords
  • Aging
  • Myelin
  • Diffusion Imaging
  • Subjective Cognitive Decline
Figure 1. Differences in T1w/T2w ratio at specific depth behind profile nonlinearity index (NLI) variations. (a) Average T1w/T2w profiles of those aged 55-60 (black) and 80-85 (grey) shown for representative regions of interest (Fig. 1c) to highlight differences in profiles. Error bars indicate one standard deviation range; (b) Individual T1w/T2w profiles colored by participants’ age. To better visualize T1w/T2w profile variations with age, individual profiles are superimposed (with 30% transparency) and centered to mean T1w/T2w values at 50% cortical depth; (c) Percentage of age-related NLI variation that is explained by the mediation effect of average T1w/T2w values from specific surfaces (superficial/deep 20% depths, and at 50% depth). Variations due to participants’ sex, body mass index (BMI), and regional cortical thickness (CT) are controlled. Partial plots of depth-specific T1w/T2w values against age in example regions, indicated by black arrows in the brain surface graphs, are shown on the right. Pearson’s correlation coefficient r and corrected p-values (p* ) are included. Shaded areas in scatter plots indicate 95% confidence intervals.
Project Team
Mariana Lazar, PhD

Project Lead

Yu Veronica Sui, PhD
Henry Rusinek, PhD
External Collaborators

Publications

  1. Flaherty R, Sui YV, Masurkar AV, Betensky RA, Rusinek H, Lazar M. Diffusion imaging markers of accelerated aging of the lower cingulum in subjective cognitive decline. Front Neurol. 2024;15:1360273. Published 2024 May 9. doi:10.3389/fneur.2024.1360273
  2. Sui YV, Masurkar AV, Rusinek H, Reisberg B, Lazar M. Cortical myelin profile variations in healthy aging brain: A T1w/T2w ratio study. Neuroimage. 2022;264:119743. doi:10.1016/j.neuroimage.2022.119743
  3. Bendlin BB, Ries ML, Canu E, et al. White matter is altered with parental family history of Alzheimer’s disease. Alzheimers Dement. 2010;6(5):394-403. doi:10.1016/j.jalz.2009.11.003

Acknowledgements

We acknowledge support from the following grant: NIH P30AG066512.

Researchers at the Center for Biomedical Imaging at NYU Langone Health develop transformative imaging technologies to advance basic science and address unsolved clinical problems.

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