Approved Research
Changes in resting state fMRI and cognitive scores associated with SARS-CoV-2 in the UK Biobank
Lay summary
The aim of this project is to investigate whether air exposure would accelerate cognitive decline/dementia in individuals who have Parkinson's disease. This will be done with data from the UK Biobank.
Parkinson's disease is a progressive neurodegenerative disorder that affects the central nervous system of the brain. Environmental exposures have become an important field of study in epidemiology, and many studies have shown associations between environmental exposures and cognitive deficits. From previous studies, there has been evidence that air pollutants like PM2.5, PM10, NO2 are positively associated with the development of Parkinson's. We are interested in another facet of this research, specifically how these air pollutants might correlate with cognitive outcomes. Cognitive assessments are an important tool for studying brain development and health. Air pollution exposure has been shown to increase the risk of cognitive impairment and significantly worse performance on cognitive functions like memory and attention. Other studies have shown that those people diagnosed with Parkinson's also have a much higher chance of having declines in cognition. However, the purpose of our study is to understand the connection between all these areas of study, and see that within the specific population of those diagnosed with Parkinson's, whether air pollution exposures are associated with accelerated cognitive decline and/or incident dementia.
Our project is estimated to take place over the course of a 12-18 month period once the data is obtained. In this timeframe, we will be collecting data from the UK Biobank on Parkinson's rates, the outcomes of cognitive assessments/tasks and rates of incident dementia, as well as residential addresses and air pollutant levels. Analysis and interpretation will be performed on these data sets. Results will be presented as a manuscript for publication and conference presentation. We believe that our study will provide a potentially high public health impact and will be an important contribution to the scientific community. Parkinson's disease (PD) is among the most common neurodegenerative disorders and affects about 10 million people around the world. Similarly, around 50 million people around the world are living with dementia. Findings from this project will help us understand the role of air pollution in development of dementia in Parkinson's patients. While rates of air pollution exposures increase around the world, it is incredibly important in the public health and epidemiology field to understand the mechanisms of this environmental exposure and how it impacts human brain health.