Abstract #2013

Age-Related Differences of Brain Activation Patterns Upon Imaginary Walking

Ekkehard Kstermann^1,2, Markus Ebke³, Katja Dolge⁴, Natascha Lohr¹, Dieter Leibfritz², Manfred Herrmann¹

¹ZKW/Neuropsychologie, Universitt Bremen, Bremen, Germany; ²Organische Chemie, Universitt Bremen, Bremen, Germany; ³Neurologie, Klinikum Bremen-Mitte, Bremen, Germany; ⁴JCLLaID, Jacobs University Bremen, Bremen, Germany

The steadiness of walking decreases in elderly with advancing age. This study was designed to explore changes in the activation pattern during walking. Healthy young and elderly subjects performed imaginated walking tasks while being scanned. Elderly subjects exhibited stronger and larger activations as compared to younger subjects with a marked increase in the IPL. During imaginated walking, negative BOLD signal changes were only observed in younger, but not in elderly subjects.