CONICET | Buscador de Institutos y Recursos Humanos

As humans age, their neurological systems normally manifest structural and functional alterations, accompanied by cognitive decline. In order to characterize such mechanisms, we aimed to identify those structures and networks which feature major changes as individuals grow old, studying aging as a multidimensional brain phenomenon and not just the loss of grey matter. We obtained structural and functional magnetic resonance images from 136 healthy subjects, ranging from age 17 to 84. We divided them in three groups in order to show more detailed differences in the process of aging (young adults, adults, seniors). Our results suggest that age-related structural and functional brain changes are maximal in the transition from young adulthood into adulthood, and less marked towards seniority, when structural loss is more anterior, but connectivity differences are mainly posterior. This way, our study provides new insights on the neurobiological correlates of healthy aging.