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Abstract:
We tested the hypothesis that neuronal metabolic integrity,
measured by Proton Magnetic Resonance Spectroscopy (1H-MRS), would
be related to intellectual and neuro-cognitive ability. Twenty-five
healthy, college age participants (16f, 9m) were recruited from
within the UNM Department of Psychology. All Magnetic Resonance
(MR) acquisitions were carried out on a 1.5 Tesla clinical scanner.
Spectroscopic voxel locations were selected within left
occipito-parietal white matter, and positioned specifically to
maximize white matter and minimize grey matter and ventricular
contribution. On a second occasion (<1 week), neuro-cognitive
examination was undertaken which quantified the domains of:
intelligence, verbal and visual memory, language, visual-spatial,
motor, and frontal "executive" functioning. Our central finding was
that spectroscopic measures of N-Acetylaspartate (NAA) were
associated with Full Scale Intelligence [F(1,21) = 8.22, P <
.01] and overall neuro-cognitive performance [F(1, 23) = 12.53, P
< .01]. Measures which utilized time as a dependent variable
were particularly sensitive to levels of NAA. The implications of
this research are discussed regarding speed of information
processing and its relevance to white matter neuronal functioning.
9B
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