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Abstract #0257

More frequent cognitive activity in late life is associated with higher brain microstructural integrity in non-demented older adults

C. M. Barth 1 , R. S. Wilson 2 , A. Capuano 2 , S. Zhang 2 , D. A. Bennett 2 , and K. Arfanakis 1

1 Department of Biomedical Engineering, Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago, Illinois, United States, 2 Rush Alzheimer's Disease Center, Rush University Medical Center, Chicago, Illinois, United States

The purpose of this study was to test the hypotheses that: a) more frequent cognitive activity in late life is associated with higher microstructural integrity in brain white matter (WM), and b) microstructural integrity in WM mediates the relation between late life cognitive activity and cognition. Diffusion tensor imaging data were collected for a community-dwelling sample of 397 older, non-demented adults. It was demonstrated that fractional anisotropy in a number of WM regions was significantly associated with frequency of late life cognitive activity. Also, FA in those WM regions partially mediated the relationship between late life cognitive activity and cognition.

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