“Our principal component analyses showed a significant relationship between centro-cingulate cholinergic afferent changes and age in our Parkinson disease subjects.”
BUFFALO, NY- November 1 , 2023 – A new research perspective was published in Aging (listed by MEDLINE/PubMed as "Aging (Albany NY)" and "Aging-US" by Web of Science) Volume 15, Issue 20 , entitled, “ Cholinergic centro-cingulate network in Parkinson disease and normal aging .”
In their new perspective, researchers Nicolaas I. Bohnen, Sygrid van der Zee and Roger Albin from University of Michigan , Veterans Administration Ann Arbor Healthcare System , University of Groningen , and the University Medical Center Groningen discussed Parkinson disease (PD). Decreased cholinergic binding within the recently identified centro-cingulate brain network has been shown to robustly correlate with the severity of cognitive impairment in PD. This network with key hubs within the cingulum, operculum and peri-central cortical regions also correlates with elements of parkinsonian motor impairments, including postural instability and gait difficulties, such as falls or freezing.
“We recently reported novel data-driving findings suggesting that cholinergic innervation deficits in centro-cingulate brain regions may be an important contributor to cognitive impairments in PD [ 1 ].”
MRI neuroimaging studies have shown that the anterior midcingulate cortex is a key node for cognitive aspects of movement generation, i.e., intentional motor control. Recent evidence also suggests a novel aspect of organization of primary motor cortex, describing “effector” regions for fine movement control intercalated with interlinked “inter-effector” regions devoted to whole-body control.
A distinguishing feature of inter-effector regions is tight linkage to the cingular and opercular regions. Such inter-effector regions have been proposed to be part of a greater somato-cognitive action network necessary for integration of goals and movement. Recent evidence also points to vulnerabilities of cholinergic nerve terminals in the centro-cingulate network in older non-PD adults. These features of normal aging underscore that cortical cholinergic terminal losses in age-associated neurodegenerative disorders are likely not exclusively the result of disease-specific etiologies but also related to otherwise normal aging.
“Practical implications of this overlap are that addressing disease-specific and general aging etiologies involved in neurodegeneration, may be of benefit in age-associated neurodegenerative disorders where significant cholinergic systems degeneration is present.”
Read the full paper: DOI: https://doi.org/10.18632/aging.205209
Corresponding Author: Nicolaas I. Bohnen
Corresponding Email: nbohnen@umich.edu
Keywords: centro-cingulate network, cholinergic, cognition, motor, Parkinson disease
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About Aging :
Launched in 2009, Aging publishes papers of general interest and biological significance in all fields of aging research and age-related diseases, including cancer—and now, with a special focus on COVID-19 vulnerability as an age-dependent syndrome. Topics in Aging go beyond traditional gerontology, including, but not limited to, cellular and molecular biology, human age-related diseases, pathology in model organisms, signal transduction pathways (e.g., p53, sirtuins, and PI-3K/AKT/mTOR, among others), and approaches to modulating these signaling pathways.
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Cholinergic centro-cingulate network in Parkinson disease and normal aging
27-Oct-2023