Effects of Moderate Intensity Exercise on the Cortical Thickness and Subcortical Volumes of Preclinical Alzheimer’s Disease Patients: A Pilot Study

Um, Yoo Hyun; Wang, Sheng‐Min; Kim, Nak-Young; Kang, Dong Woo; Na, Hae-Ran; Lee, Chang Uk; Lim, Hyun Kook

doi:10.30773/pi.2020.0214

Cited by 4 publications

(6 citation statements)

References 47 publications

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“…Our participants showed that their temporal meta-ROI cortical thickness decreased 0.94% in cycling and 1.54% for the stretching group over the 6-month intervention period, but the between-group differences were not significant. Two recent trials reported that aerobic exercise alone or in combination with cognitive training increased temporal meta-ROI cortical thickness in older adults with preclinical AD (Bae et al, 2020;Um et al, 2020). Our findings further show that over 12 months, temporal meta-ROI cortical thickness decreased 2.27% in the cycling group and 1.79% in the stretching group.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 82%

Mechanistic Effects of Aerobic Exercise in Alzheimer's Disease: Imaging Findings From the Pilot FIT-AD Trial

Mathiason

Han

et al. 2021

Front. Aging Neurosci.

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Despite strong evidence from animal models of Alzheimer's disease (AD) supporting aerobic exercise as a disease-modifying treatment for AD, human mechanistic studies are limited with mixed findings. The objective of this pilot randomized controlled trial was to examine the effects of 6-month aerobic exercise on hippocampal volume, temporal meta-regions of interest (ROI) cortical thickness, white matter hyperintensity (WMH) volume, and network failure quotient (NFQ), measured with MRI, in community-dwelling older adults with AD dementia. Additionally, the relationships between 6- and 12-month changes in MRI biomarkers and the AD Assessment Scale-Cognition (ADAS-Cog) were examined. Sixty participants were randomized, but one was excluded because baseline MRI failed quality control: 38 randomized to cycling and 21 to stretching. The intervention was moderate-intensity cycling for 20–50 mins, three times a week for 6 months. Control was low-intensity stretching. The study outcomes include hippocampal volume, temporal meta-ROI cortical thickness, WMH volume, and NFQ. Outcomes were measured at baseline, 6 months, and 12 months. The sample averaged 77.3 ± 6.3 years old with 15.6 ± 2.9 years of education and 53% men. Both groups experienced significant declines over 6 months in hippocampal volume (2.64% in cycling vs. 2.89% in stretching) and temporal meta-ROI cortical thickness (0.94 vs. 1.54%), and over 12 months in hippocampal volume (4.47 vs. 3.84%) and temporal meta-ROI cortical thickness (2.27 vs. 1.79%). These declines did not differ between groups. WMH volume increased significantly with the cycling group increasing less (10.9%) than stretching (24.5%) over 6 months (f = 4.47, p = 0.04) and over 12 months (12.1 vs. 27.6%, f = 5.88, p = 0.02). NFQ did not change significantly over time. Pairwise correlational analyses showed a significant negative correlation between 6-month changes in hippocampal volume and ADAS-Cog (r = −0.34, p < 0.05). To conclude, aerobic exercise may reduce the decline in hippocampal volume and temporal meta-ROI cortical thickness during the intervention period, but the effect sizes are likely to be very small and dose-dependent and reverse once the intervention stops. Aerobic exercise is effective on slowing down WMH progression but has no effect on NFQ. Hippocampal atrophy was associated with cognitive decline during the intervention period.Clinical Trial Registration:www.ClinicalTrials.gov, identifier: NCT01954550.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 82%

Mechanistic Effects of Aerobic Exercise in Alzheimer's Disease: Imaging Findings From the Pilot FIT-AD Trial

Mathiason

Han

et al. 2021

Front. Aging Neurosci.

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“…Long periods for relationships. Group analyses indicate activity over long periods can be related to cortical thickness [4,5,26,[28][29][30][31][32]. Consistent with these findings, in the studied individual, interactions extended over multi-week periods.…”

Section: Comparison Of the Present Individual-focused Concepts To Exi...supporting

confidence: 72%

“…Relationship bilaterality. Group-based work has reported relationships between physical activity and cortical thicknesses of both cortices [27,28,30,32]. Similarly, interactions were bilateral in the presently studied individual.…”

Section: Comparison Of the Present Individual-focused Concepts To Exi...mentioning

confidence: 60%

“…Positive relationships. Most group studies report positive relationships between physical activity and cortical thickness [4][5][6][26][27][28][29][30][31], with fewer studies finding either mixed positive and negative [32] or no [33,34] relationships. Aligning with many group-based results, interactions in the studied individual were positive.…”

Section: Comparison Of the Present Individual-focused Concepts To Exi...mentioning

confidence: 99%

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Temporal Interactions between Maintenance of Cerebral Cortex Thickness and Physical Activity from an Individual Person Micro-Longitudinal Perspective and Implications for Precision Medicine

Wall,

Xie,

Wang

2024

JPM

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Maintenance of brain structure is essential for neurocognitive health. Precision medicine has interests in understanding how maintenance of an individual person’s brain, including cerebral cortical structure, interacts with lifestyle factors like physical activity. Cortical structure, including cortical thickness, has recognized relationships with physical activity, but concepts of these relationships come from group, not individual, focused findings. Whether or how group-focused concepts apply to an individual person is fundamental to precision medicine interests but remains unclear. This issue was studied in a healthy man using concurrent micro-longitudinal tracking of magnetic resonance imaging-defined cortical thickness and accelerometer-defined steps/day over six months. These data permitted detailed examination of temporal relationships between thickness maintenance and physical activity at an individual level. Regression analyses revealed graded significant and trend-level temporal interactions between preceding activity vs. subsequent thickness maintenance and between preceding thickness maintenance vs. subsequent activity. Interactions were bidirectional, delayed/prolonged over days/weeks, positive, bilateral, directionally asymmetric, and limited in strength. These novel individual-focused findings in some ways are predicted, but in other ways remain unaddressed or undetected, by group-focused work. We suggest that individual-focused concepts of temporal interactions between maintenance of cortical structure and activity can provide needed new insight for personalized tailoring of physical activity, cortical, and neurocognitive health.

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“…Although few studies focused on CT measures in relation to aerobic fitness, previous research has reported specific positive associations of VO 2 max with the GMV 43,66 and CT of the left STG 13,67 . Moreover, moderate-intensity aerobic training may slow down cortical thinning in several brain areas in patients with Alzheimer's Disease 68 , and mean CT is also positively related with physical activity habits in cognitively healthy individuals 69 . The beneficial effect of cardiorespiratory fitness on body composition, and specifically body fat reduction, has been proposed to mediate the positive relationship between fitness and mean CT, at least in developing children 70 .…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Higher VO2max is associated with thicker cortex and lower grey matter blood flow in older adults

Olivo

Nilsson

Garzón

et al. 2021

Sci Rep

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VO2max (maximal oxygen consumption), a validated measure of aerobic fitness, has been associated with better cerebral artery compliance and measures of brain morphology, such as higher cortical thickness (CT) in frontal, temporal and cingular cortices, and larger grey matter volume (GMV) of the middle temporal gyrus, hippocampus, orbitofrontal cortex and cingulate cortex. Single sessions of physical exercise can promptly enhance cognitive performance and brain activity during executive tasks. However, the immediate effects of exercise on macro-scale properties of the brain’s grey matter remain unclear. We investigated the impact of one session of moderate-intensity physical exercise, compared with rest, on grey matter volume, cortical thickness, working memory performance, and task-related brain activity in older adults. Cross-sectional associations between brain measures and VO2max were also tested. Exercise did not induce statistically significant changes in brain activity, grey matter volume, or cortical thickness. Cardiovascular fitness, measured by VO2max, was associated with lower grey matter blood flow in the left hippocampus and thicker cortex in the left superior temporal gyrus. Cortical thickness was reduced at post-test independent of exercise/rest. Our findings support that (1) fitter individuals may need lower grey matter blood flow to meet metabolic oxygen demand, and (2) have thicker cortex.

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Effects of Moderate Intensity Exercise on the Cortical Thickness and Subcortical Volumes of Preclinical Alzheimer’s Disease Patients: A Pilot Study

Cited by 4 publications

References 47 publications

Mechanistic Effects of Aerobic Exercise in Alzheimer's Disease: Imaging Findings From the Pilot FIT-AD Trial

Mechanistic Effects of Aerobic Exercise in Alzheimer's Disease: Imaging Findings From the Pilot FIT-AD Trial

Temporal Interactions between Maintenance of Cerebral Cortex Thickness and Physical Activity from an Individual Person Micro-Longitudinal Perspective and Implications for Precision Medicine

Higher VO2max is associated with thicker cortex and lower grey matter blood flow in older adults

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