![]() This is important because the anterolateral entorhinal cortex communicates between two major parts of the brain, the hippocampus, where information is first encoded, and the neocortex, a portion that is involved with long-term storage. Scientists already knew that people who suffer from Alzheimer’s disease have signal loss in this region. In the fMRI images, the scientists could see that a region of the brain called the anterolateral entorhinal cortex may have something to do with these moments of forgetfulness in older participants. ![]() They found that older adults struggled with these subtle changes and did not do as well as younger adults in identifying new, but similar, objects in this first task. “Some of the images were identical to ones they’d seen before, some were brand new, and others were similar to ones they’d seen earlier, we may have changed the color or the size,” said Michael Yassa, senior author and director of University of California Irvine’s Center for the Neurobiology of Learning and Memory. Thanks to the fMRI, the researchers could examine the blood flow in the brain to see which areas of the brain were utilized the most by older and younger participants during these tasks. The first task involved identifying everyday objects and then distinguishing them from new ones. ![]() Participants were asked to complete two primary tasks. They analyzed 20 healthy young adults between ages 18 and 31, and 20 healthy older adults between the age of 64 and 89. To understand what happens in the brain during these forgetful episodes, scientists at the University of California in Irvine used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to analyze how the brain works when recalling information. Have you ever forgotten where you left your keys or forgotten the name of a common household object? If so, you may have wondered if this was a “senior moment” or just a memory lapse that could happen at any age.Ī new study published this month in the journal Neuron, examined what exactly happens to the brain during these forgetful episodes, and finds that blaming your age for a bad memory doesn’t always make sense.
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