Department of Integrative Medical Biology, Umeå University, Sweden.
Center for Ageing and Demographic Research, Umeå University, Sweden.
J Gerontol A Biol Sci Med Sci. 2021 May 22;76(6):955-963. doi: 10.1093/gerona/glaa322.
Leukocyte telomere length (LTL) is a proposed biomarker for aging-related disorders, including cognitive decline and dementia. Long-term longitudinal studies measuring intra-individual changes in both LTL and cognitive outcomes are scarce, precluding strong conclusions about a potential aging-related relationship between LTL shortening and cognitive decline. This study investigated associations between baseline levels and longitudinal changes in LTL and memory performance across an up to 20-year follow-up in 880 dementia-free participants from a population-based study (mean baseline age: 56.8 years, range: 40-80; 52% female). Shorter baseline LTL significantly predicted subsequent memory decline (r = .34, 95% confidence interval: 0.06, 0.82), controlling for age, sex, and other relevant covariates. No significant associations were however observed between intra-individual changes in LTL and memory, neither concurrently nor with a 5-year time-lag between LTL shortening and memory decline. These results support the notion of short LTL as a predictive factor for aging-related memory decline, but suggest that LTL dynamics in adulthood and older age may be less informative of cognitive outcomes in aging. Furthermore, the results highlight the importance of long-term longitudinal evaluation of outcomes in biomarker research.
白细胞端粒长度 (LTL) 是一种与衰老相关疾病的生物标志物，包括认知能力下降和痴呆。测量 LTL 和认知结果的个体内变化的长期纵向研究很少，因此无法就 LTL 缩短与认知能力下降之间潜在的与衰老相关的关系得出强有力的结论。本研究在一项基于人群的研究中，在 880 名无痴呆症的参与者中，对长达 20 年的随访中 LTL 的基线水平和纵向变化与记忆表现之间的关联进行了研究（平均基线年龄：56.8 岁，范围：40-80；52%为女性）。基线 LTL 较短显著预测了随后的记忆下降（r =.34，95%置信区间：0.06，0.82），控制了年龄、性别和其他相关协变量。然而，在个体内 LTL 变化与记忆之间，无论是同时还是在 LTL 缩短与记忆下降之间存在 5 年时间滞后时，都没有观察到显著的关联。这些结果支持 LTL 较短作为与衰老相关的记忆下降的预测因素的观点，但表明成年期和老年期的 LTL 动态可能对衰老过程中的认知结果的指示作用较小。此外，这些结果强调了在生物标志物研究中对结果进行长期纵向评估的重要性。
