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Cannabis Use and Resting State Functional Connectivity in the Aging Brain

Several lines of evidence suggest that older adults (aged 65+) sharply increased their cannabis use over the last decade, highlighting a need to understand the effects of cannabis in this age group. Pre-clinical models suggest that cannabinoids affect the brain and cognition in an age-dependent fash...

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Autores principales: Watson, Karli K., Bryan, Angela D., Thayer, Rachel E., Ellingson, Jarrod M., Skrzynski, Carillon J., Hutchison, Kent E.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Frontiers Media S.A. 2022
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8868145/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35221994
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fnagi.2022.804890
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author Watson, Karli K.
Bryan, Angela D.
Thayer, Rachel E.
Ellingson, Jarrod M.
Skrzynski, Carillon J.
Hutchison, Kent E.
author_facet Watson, Karli K.
Bryan, Angela D.
Thayer, Rachel E.
Ellingson, Jarrod M.
Skrzynski, Carillon J.
Hutchison, Kent E.
author_sort Watson, Karli K.
collection PubMed
description Several lines of evidence suggest that older adults (aged 65+) sharply increased their cannabis use over the last decade, highlighting a need to understand the effects of cannabis in this age group. Pre-clinical models suggest that cannabinoids affect the brain and cognition in an age-dependent fashion, having generally beneficial effects on older animals and deleterious effects on younger ones. However, there is little research on how cannabis affects the brains of older adults or how older adults differ from younger adults who use cannabis. Resting state functional connectivity (rsFC) measures provide sensitive metrics of age-related cognitive decline. Here we compared rsFC in older adults who are either regular users of cannabis or non-users. We found stronger connectivity between sources in the hippocampus and parahippocampal cortex, and targets in the anterior lobes of the cerebellum in older adult cannabis users relative to non-users. A similar pattern of strengthened connectivity between hippocampal and cerebellar structures was also present in 25–35 year old non-users in comparison to 60–88 year old non-users. These findings suggest that future studies should examine both the potential risks of cannabinoids, as well as a potential benefits, on cognition and brain health for older adults.
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spelling pubmed-88681452022-02-25 Cannabis Use and Resting State Functional Connectivity in the Aging Brain Watson, Karli K. Bryan, Angela D. Thayer, Rachel E. Ellingson, Jarrod M. Skrzynski, Carillon J. Hutchison, Kent E. Front Aging Neurosci Aging Neuroscience Several lines of evidence suggest that older adults (aged 65+) sharply increased their cannabis use over the last decade, highlighting a need to understand the effects of cannabis in this age group. Pre-clinical models suggest that cannabinoids affect the brain and cognition in an age-dependent fashion, having generally beneficial effects on older animals and deleterious effects on younger ones. However, there is little research on how cannabis affects the brains of older adults or how older adults differ from younger adults who use cannabis. Resting state functional connectivity (rsFC) measures provide sensitive metrics of age-related cognitive decline. Here we compared rsFC in older adults who are either regular users of cannabis or non-users. We found stronger connectivity between sources in the hippocampus and parahippocampal cortex, and targets in the anterior lobes of the cerebellum in older adult cannabis users relative to non-users. A similar pattern of strengthened connectivity between hippocampal and cerebellar structures was also present in 25–35 year old non-users in comparison to 60–88 year old non-users. These findings suggest that future studies should examine both the potential risks of cannabinoids, as well as a potential benefits, on cognition and brain health for older adults. Frontiers Media S.A. 2022-02-10 /pmc/articles/PMC8868145/ /pubmed/35221994 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fnagi.2022.804890 Text en Copyright © 2022 Watson, Bryan, Thayer, Ellingson, Skrzynski and Hutchison. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
spellingShingle Aging Neuroscience
Watson, Karli K.
Bryan, Angela D.
Thayer, Rachel E.
Ellingson, Jarrod M.
Skrzynski, Carillon J.
Hutchison, Kent E.
Cannabis Use and Resting State Functional Connectivity in the Aging Brain
title Cannabis Use and Resting State Functional Connectivity in the Aging Brain
title_full Cannabis Use and Resting State Functional Connectivity in the Aging Brain
title_fullStr Cannabis Use and Resting State Functional Connectivity in the Aging Brain
title_full_unstemmed Cannabis Use and Resting State Functional Connectivity in the Aging Brain
title_short Cannabis Use and Resting State Functional Connectivity in the Aging Brain
title_sort cannabis use and resting state functional connectivity in the aging brain
topic Aging Neuroscience
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8868145/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35221994
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fnagi.2022.804890
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