Here Is Why Sharp Memory Remains Intact In Some Elderly People

By Staff

Monday, December 22, 2008, 15:28

Here Is Why Sharp Memory Remains Intact In Some Elderly People

Commonly the brains cease to work in a healthy fashion once you age, but it is not the same for the 'super aged', as discovered by the new study. The elderly people who have not suffered any memory loss contain fewer fibre-like tangles as compared to the normally aged individuals as found by the Researchers at Northwestern University's Feinberg School of Medicine.

Changiz Geula reveals that the fibre-like tangles they observed consist of a protein called tau, which accumulates inside brain cells and is thought to eventually kill the cells. Such tangles increase considerably as in the case of patient suffering from Alzheimer's disease "This new finding in super aged brains is very exciting. It was always assumed that the accumulation of these tangles is a progressive phenomenon through the aging process. But we are seeing that some individuals are immune to tangle formation and that the presence of these tangles seems to influence cognitive performance," said Geula.

For the study, brains of five deceased people, who are 'super aged' were examined. These selected individuals gave high performance on memory tests when they were more than 80 years old. They compared the brains of such people with those of elderly, non-demented individuals.

While making a presentation at the Society for Neuroscience annual meeting in Washington, D.C., Geula revealed that the number of plaques in the brains of the super aged was similar to that in the brains of the normally aging group. The plaques were found in large numbers in Alzheimer's disease. Lower number of tangles made a difference in maintaining memory skills.

He even revealed that some of the super aged in the study performed memory tasks at the level of people who were about 50 years old: after being told a story, they were able to remember it immediately after and still accurately recall its details 30 minutes later. The subjects could also remember a list of 15 words and recall them equally well when tested after 30 minutes.

Further research in future studies would focus on why do cells in super aged brains become more resistant to tangle formation. "We want to see what protects the brains of these individuals against the ravages that cause memory loss. Understanding the specific genetic and molecular characteristics of the brains that makes them resistant, someday may lead to the ability to protect average brains from memory loss," Geula said.

This research is a part of super aging study at Northwestern's Cognitive Neurology and Alzheimer's Disease Center (CNADC) and currently A number of super aged individuals have been identified, and are being followed up annually with tests of cognitive abilities.