Substrates of selective neuronal vulnerability in aging: neocortical pyramidal neurons and their surrounding neuropil environment in visual versus frontal cortex of young and aged rhesus monkeys

Normal aging in primates often leads to impaired cognitive function, particularly in working memory, which begins to decline in middle-age. Our group and others have established that age-related cognitive impairment is not due to overt death of neurons but rather is associated with a constellation of sublethal changes to

neurons particularly in layer (L3), such as spine, synapse and myelin loss and consequent alterations to synaptic and intrinsic electrophysiological properties. Importantly these structural and functional changes have been abundantly observed with aging in neurons and white matter pathways in the prefrontal cortex (PFC), a

brain area that is a key player in working memory. By contrast, the properties of primary visual cortex (V1) pyramidal neurons are largely spared during normal aging. We currently lack a mechanistic understanding of why pyramidal neurons in these two brain areas are differentially vulnerable in normal aging or how age-

related changes at the single-cell and pathway level in PFC impact network function and thus working memory performance. The overall hypothesis of this project is that selective vulnerability of neurons and associated networks in LPFC compared to V1 during aging is due to key differences in both the intrinsic properties and the

neuropil context of neurons in the two areas, and a greater susceptibility of neurons in LPFC to increases in oxidative stress and inflammation. We propose a novel experimental approach -multiplexed immunohistochemistry combined with high resolution structural analyses of physiologically characterized

individual neurons- to compare the properties of individual LPFC and V1 pyramidal neurons in the context of their surrounding neuropil in young and aged rhesus monkeys. These monkeys will also have been assessed for cognitive status, pathway integrity, and CSF pro-inflammatory cytokine levels as part of other existing NIH-

funded projects. This project has two aims: 1) To assess the morphological properties of physiologically characterized L3 pyramidal neurons in LPFC and V1 of young and aged monkeys. We will assess dendritic topology and the number and density of dendritic spine subtypes and correlate these data with existing data on

30 different physiological properties of these same cells. 2) To characterize the normative properties and effects of aging on the same L3 pyramidal neurons studied in Aim 1 in the context of the neuropil. We will perform in situ immunofluorescence multiplexing of ~20 protein targets on the same tissue sample to

determine the molecular phenotype of biocytin-filled layer 3 pyramidal neurons. A major outcome of this project will be the ability to quantitatively specify those parameters that differ between L3 pyramidal neurons in two highly distinct brain areas and which combination of parameters best predict cognitive impairment in aging.

This study will form the basis of future series of larger studies to investigate relationships and co-dependence of age-related cellular changes in a variety of cell types, laminae and cortical areas during normal aging that can be correlated with cognitive performance in rhesus monkeys.