Aging & Neuromodulation

There has been increasing evidence that monoamines are important for both cognitive and motivational function across the adult life span. In parallel, other work suggests that monoaminergic nuclei are the earliest sites of Alzheimer’s disease pathology in the brain. In my work, I use multi-modal neuroimaging tools, such as fMRI and PET, to understand the complex relationships between aging, neuromodulation, cognition, and motivation across the adult life span.

Relevant publications:

Crawford, J.L., & Berry, A.S. (in press). Examining resilience to Alzheimer’s disease through the lens of monoaminergic neuromodulator systems. Trends in Neurosciences.

Green, M.A., Crawford, J.L., Kuhnen, C.M., Samanez-Larkin, G.R, & Seaman, K.L. (2023). Multivariate associations between dopamine receptor availability and risky investment decision making across adulthood. Cerebral Cortex Communications, 4(2), tgad008.

Smith, C.T., Crawford, J.L., Dang, L.C., Seaman, K.L., San Juan, M.D., Vijay, A., Katz, D.T., Matuskey, D., Cowan, R.L., Morris, E.D., Zald, D.H., & Samanez-Larkin, G.R. (2019). Partial-volume correction increases estimated dopamine D2-like receptor binding potential and reduces adult age differences. Journal of Cerebral Blood Flow & Metabolism, 39(5), 822–833.

Castrellon, J. J., Seaman, K. L., Crawford, J. L., Young, J. S., Smith, C. T., Dang, L. C., et al. (2019). Individual differences in dopamine are associated with reward discounting in clinical groups but not in healthy adults. Journal of Neuroscience, 39(2), 321-332.

Juarez, E.J., Castrellon, J.J., Green, M.A., Crawford, J.L., Seaman, K.L., Smith, C.T., Dang, L.C., Zald, D.H., & Samanez-Larkin, G.R. (2019). Reproducibility of the correlative triad among aging, dopamine receptor availability, and cognition. Psychology and Aging, 34(7), 921–932.