Imagine a group of seasoned baseball players who, as they age, start to struggle with hitting the ball. It turns out that their decline in performance is not just due to physical factors like slower reflexes or weaker muscles. A new study has found that changes in the structure of their brain, particularly in areas involved in visuomotor control, play a significant role in their diminished abilities. These findings suggest that measuring these brain changes may be a valuable tool for detecting dementia risk in its early stages. By using advanced imaging techniques, researchers were able to quantify grey matter volume and thickness as well as white matter integrity in older adults at an increased risk for Alzheimer’s disease. They discovered that lower grey matter thickness and volume, as well as lower white matter integrity, were associated with poorer visuomotor performance. These structural differences were observed in regions of the brain previously implicated in visuomotor control, and some of the affected white matter tracts overlapped with those important for visuomotor integration. This study highlights the potential for non-invasive and cost-effective methods to assess dementia risk by examining brain network dysfunction related to visuomotor control. To learn more about this fascinating research and its implications, check out the full article!

IntroductionVisuomotor impairments have been demonstrated in preclinical AD in individuals with a positive family history of dementia and APOE e4 carriers. Previous behavioral findings have also reported sex-differences in performance of visuomotor tasks involving a visual feedback reversal. The current study investigated the relationship between grey and white matter changes and non-standard visuomotor performance, as well as the effects of APOE status, family history of dementia, and sex on these brain-behavior relationships.MethodsOlder adults (n = 49) with no cognitive impairments completed non-standard visuomotor tasks involving a visual feedback reversal, plane-change, or combination of the two. Participants with a family history of dementia or who were APOE e4 carriers were considered at an increased risk for AD. T1-weighted anatomical scans were used to quantify grey matter volume and thickness, and diffusion tensor imaging measures were used to quantify white matter integrity.ResultsIn APOE e4 carriers, grey and white matter structural measures were associated with visuomotor performance. Regression analyses showed that visuomotor deficits were predicted by lower grey matter thickness and volume in areas of the medial temporal lobe previously implicated in visuomotor control (entorhinal and parahippocampal cortices). This finding was replicated in the diffusion data, where regression analyses revealed that lower white matter integrity (lower FA, higher MD, higher RD, higher AxD) was a significant predictor of worse visuomotor performance in the forceps minor, forceps major, cingulum, inferior fronto-occipital fasciculus (IFOF), inferior longitudinal fasciculus (ILF), superior longitudinal fasciculus (SLF), and uncinate fasciculus (UF). Some of these tracts overlap with those important for visuomotor integration, namely the forceps minor, forceps major, SLF, IFOF, and ILF.ConclusionThese findings suggest that measuring the dysfunction of brain networks underlying visuomotor control in early-stage AD may provide a novel behavioral target for dementia risk detection that is easily accessible, non-invasive, and cost-effective. The results also provide insight into the structural differences in inferior parietal lobule that may underlie previously reported sex-differences in performance of the visual feedback reversal task.

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