Title:
Resilience to aging: a neuroepidemiological perspective
Date:
Thursday, August 26th, 2010 at 3:00 PM
Location:
E2 – 361 EITC, Fort Garry Campus, University of Manitoba
Speaker:
Dr. Caterina Rosano
Associate professor of Epidemiology
Center for Healthy Aging and Population
Graduate School of Public Health
University of Pittsburg
Abstract:
One hypothesis to explain why older people maintain high physical and cognitive function late in life is that they have a greater “brain reserve”. However, brain reserve has not been objectively quantified, as it has mostly relied on gross measures of whole-brain abnormalities that are largely
non-specific manifestation of brain aging. Additionally, the determinants and clinical outcomes of brain reserve have not been characterized systematically. I will first review our new definition of brain reserve
obtained through the application of advanced neuroimaging methods. I will then identify the main clinical outcomes of brain reserve by using longitudinal extensive data from large epidemiological cohort data.
Speaker Bio:
Dr. Rosano is a physician and geriatric neuroepidemiologist. She is currently the PI of two brain MRI studies to identify the predictors of accelerated brain aging. Specifically, Dr. Rosano is developing a model to identify the determinants of cognitive and physical aging among community-dwelling older adults. Dr. Rosano has applied multimodal MRI measures of brain structural and functional integrity in longitudinal epidemiological studies of aging, including the Cardiovascular Health Study, the Gingko Evaluation Memory, the AGES-Reykjavik and the LIFEp study. By understanding the relationship between brain and physical function, Dr. Rosano hopes to identify predictors of successful aging.
Dr. Rosano has obtained an MD from the School of Medicine, Palermo, Italy,
in 1995 and an MPH at the U. of Pittsburgh in 2003. Prior to her training in neuroepidemiology, she has been a postdoctoral fellow at the Jackson Memorial Hospital in Miami, where she measured the neuroregenerative
potential of the gray and white matter of the central nervous system. She subsequently joined the Neurobehavioral Research unit at the University of Pittsburgh (1999- 2001) and used brain fMRI to investigate age-related changes in brain performance and sensorimotor integration. From 2001-2004,
Dr. Rosano was a selected NIA Fellow in the Department of Epidemiology at the University of Pittsburgh while studying the epidemiology of age-related brain structural and functional impairment.
Cost:
Free, All are welcome.
Contact:
For questions or more information contact Sherif Sherif at 474-6893.
