Cross-sectional brain age assessments are limited in predicting future brain change

Korbmacher, M.; Vidal-Pineiro, D.; Wang, M.-Y.; van der Meer, D.; Wolfers, T.; Nakua, H.; Eikefjord, E.; Andreassen, O.; Westlye, L. T.; Maximov, I. I.

doi:10.1101/2024.09.11.612523

bioRxiv · 10.1101/2024.09.11.612523

Cross-sectional brain age assessments are limited in predicting future brain change

Korbmacher, M.·Vidal-Pineiro, D.·Wang, M.-Y.·van der Meer, D.·Wolfers, T.·Nakua, H.·Eikefjord, E.·Andreassen, O.·Westlye, L. T.·Maximov, I. I.

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Abstract

The concept of brain age (BA) describes an integrative imaging marker of brain health, often suggested to reflect ageing processes. However, the degree to which cross-sectional MRI features, including BA, reflect past, ongoing and future brain changes across different tissue types from macro-to microstructure remains controversial (Vidal-Pineiro et al. 2021). Here, we advance these findings by using multimodal imaging data of 39, 325 UK Biobank participants, aged 44 - 82 years at baseline and 2, 520 follow-ups within 1.12 - 6.90 years. In concordance with the original findings, we find insufficient evidence that BA reflects the rate of brain ageing. However, modality-specific differences in brain ages reflected the state of the brain, highlighting diffusion and multimodal MRI brain age as potentially useful cross-sectional markers.

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Korbmacher, M., Vidal-Pineiro, D., Wang, M.-Y., van der Meer, D., Wolfers, T., Nakua, H., Eikefjord, E., Andreassen, O., Westlye, L. T., Maximov, I. I.. 2024-09-15. Cross-sectional brain age assessments are limited in predicting future brain change. https://doi.org/10.1101/2024.09.11.612523

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