Lifecourse Activity Participation From Early, Mid, and Later Adulthood as Determinants of Cognitive Aging: The Lothian Birth Cohort 1921

OBJECTIVES: To examine potential sensitive periods for activity participation across adulthood to reduce cognitive decline and to determine whether associations persist after accounting for the lifetime stability of cognitive ability. METHOD: The Lothian Birth Cohort 1921 is a longitudinal study of cognitive aging. Participants were born in 1921 and most completed a mental ability test at the age of 11 years. Cognitive assessments were completed at mean ages 79 (N = 550), 83 (N = 321), 87 (N = 235), and 90 years (N = 129). Participants provided retrospective details of their activity participation for young (20–35 years), mid (40–55 years), and later adulthood (60–75 years), and contemporaneously at age 79. RESULTS: Associations between activity and the level of, and change in, cognitive ability in old age were examined with latent growth curve models. Accounting for demographics and childhood cognitive ability, engagement in leisure activities in midlife was positively associated with cognitive ability level (path coefficient = .32), whereas higher physical activity in later adulthood was associated with less cognitive decline (.27). DISCUSSION: The findings support a lifecourse approach in identifying determinants of cognitive aging; leisure and physical activity during different periods of adulthood may enhance cognitive abilities or reduce decline

NewsThings

NewsThings explores how the news media sector might combine audience engagement with ambient design and the IoT to create a unique, collaborative new model for news. Partners John Mills (University of Central Lancashire) Tom Metcalfe (Thomas Buchanan Consultancy) and Alison Gow (Trinity Mirror), explain how NewsThings, backed by the Google DNI fund, has gone from concept to reality, and what the emergence of connected objects it could mean for the news industry

Navigating Digital Ethics for Rural Research : Guidelines and recommendations for researchers and administrators of social media groups

This document was produced as a deliverable of the research project “Navigating Digital Ethics for Rural Research: Guidelines and recommendations for researchers and administrators of social media groups” (DigiEthics). Digiethics is a transdisciplinary project seeking to advance digital ethics by co-designing guidelines for engaging Facebook groups. This project was funded by the by the British Academy Early Career Research Network Scotland Hub Seed Fund 2023. This document is available online with background information at: https://www.hutton.ac.uk/research/ projects/digiethics-navigating-digital-ethics-rural-research If you have read/used this document and you have any comments or feedback you would like to share with us, we would love to hear from you. Please contact [email protected] PD

Carotid disease at age 73 and cognitive change from age 70 to 76 years. A longitudinal cohort study

Cognitive decline and carotid artery atheroma are common at older ages. In community-dwelling subjects, we assessed cognition at ages 70, 73 and 76 and carotid Doppler ultrasound at age 73, to determine whether carotid stenosis was related to cognitive decline. We used latent growth curve models to examine associations between four carotid measures (internal carotid artery stenosis, velocity, pulsatility and resistivity indices) and four cognitive ability domains (memory, visuospatial function, crystallised intelligence, processing speed) adjusted for cognitive ability at age 11, current age, gender and vascular risk factors. Amongst 866 participants, carotid stenosis (median 12.96%) was not associated with cognitive abilities at age 70 or cognitive decline from age 70 to 76. Increased ICA pulsatility and resistivity indices were associated with slower processing speed (both P &lt; 0.001) and worse visuospatial function ( P = 0.036, 0.031, respectively) at age 70, and declining crystallised intelligence from ages 70 to 76 ( P = 0.008, 0.006, respectively). The findings suggest that vascular stiffening, rather than carotid luminal narrowing, adversely influences cognitive ageing and provides a potential target for ameliorating age-related cognitive decline. </jats:p

Higher frequency of cardiovascular autonomic neuropathy in youth with type 2 compared to type 1 diabetes : Role of cardiometabolic risk factors

Objective Cardiovascular autonomic neuropathy (CAN) is an overlooked but common and serious diabetes complication. We examined CAN in youth with diabetes and associations with cardiovascular risk factors. Research Design and Methods This was a prospective cohort of youth aged <20 years with type 2 or type 1 diabetes (n = 66/1153, median age 15.4/16.5 years, duration 1.7/8.0 years), assessed between 2009 and 2020. CAN was defined as ≥2 abnormal heart rate variability measures across time, geometric, and frequency domains. Obesity was defined as BMI ≥ 95th percentile and severe obesity as ≥120% of 95th percentile. Multivariable generalized estimating equations (GEE) were used to examine putative risk factors for CAN, including diabetes type, obesity, and HbA1c. Results At most recent assessment, youth with type 2 versus type 1 diabetes had median: HbA1c 7.1% (54 mmol/mol) versus 8.7% (72 mmol/mol) and BMI SDS (2.0 vs. 0.7); frequency of CAN (47% vs. 27%), peripheral nerve abnormality (47% vs. 25%), hypertension (29% vs. 12%), albuminuria (21% vs. 3%), and severe obesity (35% vs. 2%). In multivariable GEE, CAN was associated with type 2 diabetes: Odds Ratio 2.53, 95% CI 1.46, 4.38, p = 0.001, higher BMI SDS: 1.49, 95% CI 1.29, 1.73, p < 0.0001, and obesity: 2.09, 95% CI 1.57, 2.78, p < 0.0001. Conclusions Youth with type 2 diabetes have a higher frequency of CAN, peripheral nerve abnormality, hypertension, albuminuria and severe obesity despite shorter diabetes duration and younger age. Our findings highlight the importance of targeting modifiable risk factors to prevent cardiovascular disease in youth with diabetes

Hog1 regulates stress tolerance and virulence in the emerging fungal pathogen Candida auris

We thank Elizabeth Johnson and Adrien Szekely from the Mycology Reference Laboratory, Public Health England, for the clinical C. auris isolates used in this study. We also thank Katharina Trunk for comments on the manuscript. This work was funded by the BBSRC (BB/K016393/1, BB/P020119/1) and the Wellcome Trust (097377/101873). The funders had no role in study design, data collection and interpretation, or the decision to submit the work for publication.Peer reviewedPublisher PD