The overall goal of this work package is to identify factors that make us have a longer health span. We will explore how everyday changes in brain activity relate to cognition, emotions, and social thinking in people at risk for Alzheimer’s disease. Both normal ageing and Alzheimer’s disease have several defining characteristics, yet, both conditions also include individual differences. Such individual differences are the focus of this work package. We plan to follow a small number of people over time, tracking how their thinking and emotions fluctuate from day to day. A key brain structure here is the locus coeruleus, a tiny brain structure that helps control attention and emotions. Importantly, this structure constitutes one of the first brain structures that undergoes pathological changes in Alzheimer’s disease. Differences in how this structure functions and how its connections to key memory-processing areas like the hippocampus changes during ageing may help explain why some people decline faster than others. By studying such individual patterns, we hope to identify early signs of Alzheimer’s disease and test whether manipulations can strengthen brain function and help reduce memory and emotional impairments.

We use high resolution magnetic resonance imaging that allows us to look deep into the brain in order to reveal changes that occur in healthy versus pathological aging. Further, we look at eye movement patterns, sweating and changes in cardiovascular responses. We also measure how people perform at different computer games to measure their motivation, memory and drive.