Cognitive rescue in aging through prior training in rats

Gros A(1), Wang SH(1).

Author information:
(1)Centre for Clinical Brain Sciences, The University of Edinburgh,
Chancellor’s Building, Edinburgh, Scotland, UK.

Cognitive decline in spatial memory is seen in aging. Understanding affected
processes in aging is vital for developing methods to improve wellbeing. Daily
memory persistence can be influenced by events around the time of learning or by
prior experiences in early life. Fading memories in young can last longer if a
novel event is introduced around encoding, a process called behavioral tagging.
Based on this principle, we asked what processes are affected in aging and if
prior training can rescue them. Two groups of aged rats received training in an
appetitive delayed matching-to-place task. One of the groups additionally
received prior training of the same task in young and in mid-life, constituting
a longitudinal study. The results showed long-term memory decline in late aging
without prior training. This would reflect affected encoding and consolidation.
On the other hand, short-term memory was preserved and novelty at memory
reactivation and reconsolidation enabled memory maintenance in aging. Prior
training improved cognition through facilitating task performance, strengthening
short-term memory and intermediate memory, and enabling encoding-boosted
long-term memory. Implication of these findings in understanding brain
mechanisms in cognitive aging and in beneficial effects of prior training is
discussed.

DOI: 10.18632/aging.204808
PMCID: PMC10373978
PMID: 37338529 [Indexed for MEDLINE]

Conflict of interest statement: CONFLICTS OF INTEREST: The authors declare that
the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial
relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

Auteurs Bordeaux Neurocampus