5 ms·

Largest brain imaging study identifies drivers of brain aging

52 points by prostoalex 8y ago

sigi45 8y ago
Who said weed is save? Cannabis is a drug/substance which has an effect on us and if the only effect is brain aging of a few years -> okay. Was not able to find the paper, anyone has the link? Not sure yet if i should care. I will drink my gin tonic, smoke something later on and still live with adhs while contemplating my life.
forthispurpose 8y ago
What did they mean by "abuse" in this case?
threatofrain 8y ago
Surprising that they didn't find depression to be predictive, given that it should be correlated to so many other negative things.
tw1010 8y ago
At what age is brain aging considered having gone from a good thing to a bad thing?
erokar 8y ago
People with schizophrenia, bipolar disorder and ADHD usually take drugs that might influence "brain aging" — i.e. the disease itself might not be the culprit.
- leetbulb 8y ago
  This exactly was my first thought. Some of the medications used to treat these are nasty.
- zeristor 8y ago
  It would be interesting if they could tie damage down to each medicine used. Although Schizophrenia, and ADHD seem to be tied to the brain being over active, at least that’s my interpretation of it.
asdf1234tx 8y ago
Article is light on details on what constitutes brain aging, but judging by 85 year old Willie Nelson's articulateness in his 2018 interviews, I hope to be aging my brain some day, as I get closer to retirement. Deep, gravelly, I don't give a fuck, voice. Zero hesitation, when he feels like expressing himself.
- subcosmos 8y ago
  Article is light on a number of things, but I can illuminate some things... Having worked in one of the largest centers that do this kind of work, the standard practice is to do regression models that predict the atrophy of different brain regions as a function of age. Several longevity studies have implicated grey matter densities in the anterior cingulate cortex as predictive of living for a long time. Almost all of this prior work has been done with T1 imaging and DTI. SPECT is a new kid on the block, and has a lot of fans and detractors. It's use is somewhat controversial it seems. Someday I'll have time to dig deeper into the tech. This correlates with low neuroticism scores, and is also a brain region that SSRIs improve grey matter volumes of over the long term. So remain chill, and prosper
- bena 8y ago
  You may be arguing from exception here. Yes, Willie Nelson is seemingly doing fine. But we don't know for sure how much he actually smokes. We have his claims. But even giving him his self-reported claims, he is still a sample size of one. Your mileage will vary. Basically what you have done here is taken a piece of information, realized you don't like the results, and have found a way to rationalize continuing doing what you were doing anyway. If you have ever complained about someone not believing in facts, not doing research, not trusting data, not trusting science, you have just put lie to your reasons for doing so. Because you are behaving just like them. Discarding information that makes you uncomfortable. And we can't do that.
  - coldtea 8y ago
    >Your mileage will vary. Which makes an one-size-fits-all research less relevant as an absolute rule. >If you have ever complained about someone not believing in facts, not doing research, not trusting data, not trusting science Then you've done fine, as: 1) science is not some holy gospel given from god but a man-made endeavor (and prone to corruption, politics, error, careerism, and so on), 2) data can be manipulated or misread, 3) research can be bought, manipulated for grants, follow the wrong methodology, be unreproducible, and so on 4) facts themselves have no value unless you've seen them with your own eyes (and even then, you could be delusional or mistaken). With the term "fact" we denote something collected and reported by somebody that might be mistaken, told BS (e.g. how people self-report lies in studies and polls), distorted the actual bare facts for political reasons or private interests, and so on. Not even peer review is some kind of holy process for the truth. All kinds of crap (even auto-generated) have passed peer review, academics prop each other up in little cliques all the time, tons of peer reviewed studies were found wrong and unreproducible, few "reviewers" take the time to reproduce or verify a study (to the point that studies quote the same old study for decades, and base their recommendations on it, and then it's found to be unsubstantiated BS), and meta-studies are more often than not very shallow. If you trust science, you're not scientific and empirical enough. Verify the crap out of everything you here, even if it's sold as "science".
aaaaaaaaaab 8y ago
Uh-oh, cannabis makes your brain age faster than alcohol? Stoner apologists won’t be happy about this... I predict a wave of anecdotal evidence and broscience along the lines of: - “but it cured my depression” - “nobody dies of cannabis overdose, but many people die from alcohol poisoning, checkmate!” - “but it makes me sleep well, and sleeping is healthy” - “it can cure cancer, but big pharma doesn’t want you to know”
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- thatcat 8y ago
  Speaking of broscience - that sure is a nice graphic they made, but the article they cited notes that they essentially defined brain aging themselves using their model and found it associated "alcohol use, cannabis use, anxiety, bipolar, schizophrenia, attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, and in men"; but their pretty graphic leaves out being a man as a source of brain aging in their graphic for some reason.
- bitL 8y ago
  Maybe it cures depression because it burns those cells contributing most to it, which is measured as aging? (maybe /s, who knows?)
- trisomy21 8y ago
  You sound like you could use a joint.
- monetus 8y ago
  Please don't troll on hn. Neuroplasticity seems real; I have trouble seeing how encouraging anger will benefit any of us here.
  - zeristor 8y ago
    But does anger increase brain aging?
- 8y ago
patfla 8y ago
Amen Clinics and SPECT? Right. Google for it. And yet Daniel Amen seems to have acquired many reasonable sounding co-authors for the paper.
evo_9 8y ago
What about this? https://www.nature.com/articles/npjamd201612#abstract https://www.nature.com/articles/npjamd201612#abstract
mistersquid 8y ago
A number of articles report scientific skepticism regarding Daniel Amen and SPECT imaging, including articles published by the Washington Post and WIRED magazine. [0] [1] [2] [0] https://www.wired.com/2008/05/mf-neurohacks/?currentPage=all https://www.wired.com/2008/05/mf-neurohacks/?currentPage=all [1] https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/magazine/daniel-amen-is-the-most-popular-psychiatrist-in-america-to-most-researchers-and-scientists-thats-a-very-bad-thing/2012/08/07/467ed52c-c540-11e1-8c16-5080b717c13e_story.html?noredirect=on&utm_term=.6512b2f7d58e https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/magazine/daniel-ame... [2] https://sciencebasedmedicine.org/dr-amens-love-affair-with-spect-scans/ https://sciencebasedmedicine.org/dr-amens-love-affair-with-s...
kebert 8y ago
If I'm understanding their findings correctly- https://sci-hub.tw/https://content.iospress.com/articles/journal-of-alzheimers-disease/jad180598 https://sci-hub.tw/https://content.iospress.com/articles/jou... It would seem that having dementia, depression, and traumatic brain injury would result in you having a younger brain? Doesn't seem right

52 points by prostoalex 8y ago

Who said weed is save? Cannabis is a drug/substance which has an effect on us and if the only effect is brain aging of a few years -> okay. Was not able to find the paper, anyone has the link? Not sure yet if i should care. I will drink my gin tonic, smoke something later on and still live with adhs while contemplating my life.

forthispurpose 8y ago

What did they mean by "abuse" in this case?

threatofrain 8y ago

Surprising that they didn't find depression to be predictive, given that it should be correlated to so many other negative things.

tw1010 8y ago

At what age is brain aging considered having gone from a good thing to a bad thing?

erokar 8y ago

People with schizophrenia, bipolar disorder and ADHD usually take drugs that might influence "brain aging" — i.e. the disease itself might not be the culprit.

leetbulb 8y ago
This exactly was my first thought. Some of the medications used to treat these are nasty.
zeristor 8y ago
It would be interesting if they could tie damage down to each medicine used. Although Schizophrenia, and ADHD seem to be tied to the brain being over active, at least that’s my interpretation of it.

asdf1234tx 8y ago

Article is light on details on what constitutes brain aging, but judging by 85 year old Willie Nelson's articulateness in his 2018 interviews, I hope to be aging my brain some day, as I get closer to retirement. Deep, gravelly, I don't give a fuck, voice. Zero hesitation, when he feels like expressing himself.

subcosmos 8y ago
Article is light on a number of things, but I can illuminate some things... Having worked in one of the largest centers that do this kind of work, the standard practice is to do regression models that predict the atrophy of different brain regions as a function of age. Several longevity studies have implicated grey matter densities in the anterior cingulate cortex as predictive of living for a long time. Almost all of this prior work has been done with T1 imaging and DTI. SPECT is a new kid on the block, and has a lot of fans and detractors. It's use is somewhat controversial it seems. Someday I'll have time to dig deeper into the tech. This correlates with low neuroticism scores, and is also a brain region that SSRIs improve grey matter volumes of over the long term. So remain chill, and prosper
bena 8y ago
You may be arguing from exception here. Yes, Willie Nelson is seemingly doing fine. But we don't know for sure how much he actually smokes. We have his claims. But even giving him his self-reported claims, he is still a sample size of one. Your mileage will vary. Basically what you have done here is taken a piece of information, realized you don't like the results, and have found a way to rationalize continuing doing what you were doing anyway. If you have ever complained about someone not believing in facts, not doing research, not trusting data, not trusting science, you have just put lie to your reasons for doing so. Because you are behaving just like them. Discarding information that makes you uncomfortable. And we can't do that.
- coldtea 8y ago
  >Your mileage will vary. Which makes an one-size-fits-all research less relevant as an absolute rule. >If you have ever complained about someone not believing in facts, not doing research, not trusting data, not trusting science Then you've done fine, as: 1) science is not some holy gospel given from god but a man-made endeavor (and prone to corruption, politics, error, careerism, and so on), 2) data can be manipulated or misread, 3) research can be bought, manipulated for grants, follow the wrong methodology, be unreproducible, and so on 4) facts themselves have no value unless you've seen them with your own eyes (and even then, you could be delusional or mistaken). With the term "fact" we denote something collected and reported by somebody that might be mistaken, told BS (e.g. how people self-report lies in studies and polls), distorted the actual bare facts for political reasons or private interests, and so on. Not even peer review is some kind of holy process for the truth. All kinds of crap (even auto-generated) have passed peer review, academics prop each other up in little cliques all the time, tons of peer reviewed studies were found wrong and unreproducible, few "reviewers" take the time to reproduce or verify a study (to the point that studies quote the same old study for decades, and base their recommendations on it, and then it's found to be unsubstantiated BS), and meta-studies are more often than not very shallow. If you trust science, you're not scientific and empirical enough. Verify the crap out of everything you here, even if it's sold as "science".

aaaaaaaaaab 8y ago

Uh-oh, cannabis makes your brain age faster than alcohol? Stoner apologists won’t be happy about this... I predict a wave of anecdotal evidence and broscience along the lines of: - “but it cured my depression” - “nobody dies of cannabis overdose, but many people die from alcohol poisoning, checkmate!” - “but it makes me sleep well, and sleeping is healthy” - “it can cure cancer, but big pharma doesn’t want you to know”

deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
thatcat 8y ago
Speaking of broscience - that sure is a nice graphic they made, but the article they cited notes that they essentially defined brain aging themselves using their model and found it associated "alcohol use, cannabis use, anxiety, bipolar, schizophrenia, attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, and in men"; but their pretty graphic leaves out being a man as a source of brain aging in their graphic for some reason.
bitL 8y ago
Maybe it cures depression because it burns those cells contributing most to it, which is measured as aging? (maybe /s, who knows?)
trisomy21 8y ago
You sound like you could use a joint.
monetus 8y ago
Please don't troll on hn. Neuroplasticity seems real; I have trouble seeing how encouraging anger will benefit any of us here.
- zeristor 8y ago
  But does anger increase brain aging?
8y ago

patfla 8y ago

Amen Clinics and SPECT? Right. Google for it. And yet Daniel Amen seems to have acquired many reasonable sounding co-authors for the paper.

evo_9 8y ago

What about this? https://www.nature.com/articles/npjamd201612#abstract https://www.nature.com/articles/npjamd201612#abstract

mistersquid 8y ago

A number of articles report scientific skepticism regarding Daniel Amen and SPECT imaging, including articles published by the Washington Post and WIRED magazine. [0] [1] [2] [0] https://www.wired.com/2008/05/mf-neurohacks/?currentPage=all https://www.wired.com/2008/05/mf-neurohacks/?currentPage=all [1] https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/magazine/daniel-amen-is-the-most-popular-psychiatrist-in-america-to-most-researchers-and-scientists-thats-a-very-bad-thing/2012/08/07/467ed52c-c540-11e1-8c16-5080b717c13e_story.html?noredirect=on&utm_term=.6512b2f7d58e https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/magazine/daniel-ame... [2] https://sciencebasedmedicine.org/dr-amens-love-affair-with-spect-scans/ https://sciencebasedmedicine.org/dr-amens-love-affair-with-s...

kebert 8y ago

If I'm understanding their findings correctly- https://sci-hub.tw/https://content.iospress.com/articles/journal-of-alzheimers-disease/jad180598 https://sci-hub.tw/https://content.iospress.com/articles/jou... It would seem that having dementia, depression, and traumatic brain injury would result in you having a younger brain? Doesn't seem right