Cognitive differences linked to amyloid at age 70

People with more harmful amyloid plaques in the brain already score worse than their peers on cognitive tests at age 70, finds a new UCL-led study. Amyloid plaques are implicated in Alzheimer's disease, which typically develops multiple years later, so the new findings, published in Neurology , might show early warning signs before any disease develops. "Our study found that small differences in thinking and memory associated with amyloid plaques in the brain are detectible in older adults even at an age when those who are destined to develop dementia are still likely to be many years away from having symptoms," said lead author Professor Jonathan Schott (UCL Queen Square Institute of Neurology). The study participants have been tracked since birth in the world's longest-running cohort study, so the research team was also able to see how test scores compared to childhood tests. Higher cognitive test scores at age eight, as well as increased education and socioeconomic status, predicted thinking and memory performance at age 70. The effect was independent of amyloid deposition in the brain, and therefore does not suggest that dementia risk is related to childhood test scores. The study involved 502 people all born during the same week in 1946 in Great Britain, who are part of the Medical Research Council National Survey of Health and Development, housed within the MRC Unit of Lifelong Health and Ageing at UCL.