L J Whalley

..We believe that the role of epigenetics in the normal variation in human intelligence merits further study and that this novel finding should be tested in other cohorts...

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..We concluded that anticholinergic drug use in this narrow age range sample was linked to cognitive impairment but not to subsequent dementia...

..A life-course approach to dementia pathophysiology may help to elucidate the nature and timing of interventions that might delay dementia onset...

..Childhood intelligence predicts mortality throughout most of the life span. However, it is unknown whether its effect persists into advanced old age...

..Alteration of enzyme activity due to polymorphisms in the PON genes may influence the development of atheroma and thus affect stroke risk. Three PON genes (PON1, PON2 and PON3) have been identifiedand mapped to chromosome 7...

..It also examined the relationship of these polymorphisms with serum lipid profiles in cases and controls...

..A limitation of many studies is the lack of a sufficiently long period between cognitive assessments to examine determinants. Here, the aim is to examine influences on cognitive ageing between childhood and old age...

..Non-pathological cognitive ageing is a distressing condition affecting an increasing number of people in our 'ageing society'. Oxidative stress is hypothesised to have a major role in cellular ageing, including brain ageing...

..In this sample, smoking makes a small (<1% variance) independent negative contribution to cognitive aging...

..The cognitive reserve hypothesis conforms with reported associations between early and mid life lifestyle choices, early education, lifelong dietary habit, leisure pursuits and the retention of late life mental ability...

..Food supplement use is widely promoted, but little is known about the cognitive effects of food supplements...

..Biological mechanisms that explain how fetal development might influence the risk of adult disease may be relevant to many age-related diseases including the dementias and, possibly, to the biology of ageing...

..This inconsistency may arise because the relation is present only in the absence of the apolipoprotein E epsilon4 (APOE epsilon4) allele...

..To describe the discovery and development of the Aberdeen 1921 and 1936 birth cohort studies...

..To examine associations between age at natural menopause, childhood IQ and cognition at age 65 years. To determine if lower age at menopause partly mediates the effect of childhood IQ on cognition at age 65 years...

..To examine links between childhood mental ability and dementia using data from a 1932 survey of the mental ability of the 1921 Scottish birth cohort...

..Dietary supplement (DS) use is actively promoted among old people but there is little evidence in favour of DS use or information about the demographic, health and cognitive characteristics of DS users...

..These data are consistent with the putative benefits of dietary vitamin C and folate intake and the role of cholesterol in age related neurodegeneration...

..To investigate the relations between premorbid and current mental ability, mood, and white matter signal abnormalities detected by T2 weighted brain magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and impairment of balance and mobility in older adults...

..These data confirm the adverse effect of smoking on information processing speed, and provide new evidence for a similar adverse effect on memory for people in their mid-sixties...

..This indicates that MR imaging-depicted white matter lesions are of clinical importance...

..Controlling for this factor did not alter the association between mental ability and mortality. CONCLUSION: Childhood mental ability is a significant factor among the variables that predict age at death...

..The possibility that those with higher cognitive ability during earlier adult life consume more nutrient-rich diets in later life could provide an alternative explanation for the associations seen in observational studies...

..To determine the extent to which correlates of edentulism are explained by an association between tooth loss and cognitive ability...

..Future studies will require very large (> or = 600) sample sizes, molecular genetic analysis, and environmental data that span neurodevelopment and the period between disease onset and appearance of clinical symptoms...

..Lower childhood IQ may contribute to coping less well with later life. Lower QoL is not an invariable concomitant of mild cognitive decline...

..Old age is associated with reduced cognitive performance. Nutritional factors may contribute to this association...

..This study sought to examine the association between organic solvent exposure and cognitive function in later life...

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..The direct-weighted Schedule for the Evaluation of Individual Quality of Life, Direct Weighting (SEIQoL-DW) is an individualised measure of QoL that has been little used in very elderly people...

..To investigate whether, in old age, brain volume differences are associated with age-related change in general mental ability and/or specific cognitive abilities...

..We conclude that the intellectual challenges experienced during life, such as education and occupation, accumulate reserve and allow cognitive function to be maintained in old age...

..CONCLUSIONS: The association between hypertension and lower cognitive function in adulthood is partly accounted for by individual differences in childhood IQ...

..To investigate the role of genetic factors in diseases of later life...

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..The results are discussed in terms of the withdrawal effects of caffeine during cognitive testing and strong links between SES and cognitive performance. No evidence in support of cognitive enhancing effects of caffeine was found...

..The relative preservation of complex reasoning skills in old age may be associated with the preservation of the neural networks that underpin fundamental information processing in youth...

..To test the prediction of survival using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI)-derived global and regional brain volumes in subjects aged 78 to 79 without dementia...

..When statistical models that include childhood adversity are tested, these attenuate and sometimes remove the contribution of IQ to morbidity and premature death...

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..Telomere shortening in peripheral blood leukocytes is a promising index of ischemic heart disease risk in older people and deserves further investigation as a potential mechanism...

..More compelling is the association between increased plasma homocysteine concentration and later increased risk of dementia. This association is possibly caused by an inadequate intake of vitamin B(12)/folate...

..These changes may reflect the suggested (excito-)toxicity of HCY and its putative contribution to neurodegenerative disease...

..91) and rs846910-A/G (p=.90) between the groups. We conclude that these variants in HSD11B1 are not significant contributors to the range of cognitive ageing examined here...

..More generally for studies in genetics, the methodological innovation developed here implies that large (national) data collections can provide sufficient information on twin pairs to estimate genetic parameters, even without zygosity...

..Therefore, COMT genotype may contribute to differences in normal cognitive aging and to differences in some of the major personality traits in old age...

..Future trials of the effects of antihypertensive therapy on cognition should focus more on outcomes other than memory. Early differential effects of therapeutic agents may not be maintained...

..To investigate how childhood mental ability (IQ) is related to mortality and morbidity risk, when socioeconomic factors are also considered...

..Variation in the KLOTHO gene is a possible contributor to life-long reasoning differences in humans and/or to the ageing of non-verbal reasoning, especially in women...

..To test the hypothesis that physical fitness is associated with more successful cognitive aging...

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..The possibility that this result might be a selection effect was not supported by the samples being in Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium with respect to the distribution of NCSTN genotypes...

..Neither nonverbal reasoning nor verbal fluency were affected. In this sample, APOE genotype contributed to verbal memory in old age...

..However, current progress in genetic knowledge, technology and informatics will contribute to progress in this important area...

..The data did suggest that risk of cognitive decline is greater when Pro12Ala carriers contract diabetes...

..In future studies, it is important to consider other pathways which may account for variance in the link between childhood IQ and health in later life...

..17, p=0.022) adjustment for mental ability at age 11. This might be a type 1 error. Otherwise, we find that telomere length in old age does not have a significant association with age-related physical and cognitive decline or mortality...

..To test the hypothesis that parameters of retinal vascular network geometry are significantly associated with cognition...

..There were, however, no significant associations of CETP genotype with either childhood IQ or current cognitive function in old age, or with lifetime change in cognitive function...

..9 (95% C.I. 34.3-35.5), and Met/Met 34.9 (95% C.I. 34.1-35.8). This study adds to the evidence that the Val/Val polymorphism has a detrimental effect on cognition, extending upwards the age range in which such an effect has been detected...

..Some of this effect might be due to hypertension. This contribution is independent of mental function in early life and is associated with general cognitive ability...

..02), which could indicate that this gene is under selection. Polymorphisms at the two studied genes are unlikely to be risk factors for normal cognitive ageing...

..This effect of the APOE epsilon 4 allele on normal cognitive ageing may be mediated by a mechanism that is at least partly independent of its predisposing effect towards Alzheimer's disease...

..Longitudinal studies in which mental ability earlier in life is known are needed to clarify the relationship...

..The same mental ability difference of about 5 IQ points was found, and was not accounted for by father's occupation, overcrowding in the childhood home, childhood height, school attendance or the number of people in the family...

..An interaction between PRNP and klotho (KL) genotypes was also identified (p=0.015), highlighting the importance of analysing gene interactions when investigating associations with quantitative traits...

..RIMS1 encodes a synapse active-zone protein with important roles in the maintenance of normal synaptic function: mice lacking this protein have greatly reduced learning ability and memory function...

..To determine the association between prescribed medication and life long changes in cognitive ability...

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