Fountain of Youth or just good genes? We all seem to know one: an elderly friend or relative with the energy, mobility and mental sharpness of someone decades younger.
A University of Minnesota researcher will use a new federal grant to figure it out the mystery of why some people are "SuperAgers."
"They're telling us, you know, I was white water rafting this weekend and I was out running the marathon," says University of Minnesota physical therapist Jacqueline Palmer.
Palmer will study why people known as "SuperAgers" can still do these things well into their 70's and 80's - or beyond. She has been awarded a $2.2 million New Innovator Award from the National Institutes of Health’s High Risk, High Reward Research program to investigate distinguishing features of brain health and longevity in older adults who defy the typical declines in advanced age.
"Do these individuals possess this heightened capacity for their brains to adapt to this heightened capacity for neuroplasticity? We're also aiming to identify what brain regions are most involved in that plasticity," says Palmer.
She says the goal is to develop therapies that can improve everyone's quality of life in their golden years.
"A lot of us have those kind of dreams and ambitions to still be able to, you know, be functioning at that high of a physical level as we get older," Palmer adds. "And so, I think that there is a lot that we can learn from these individuals."
Palmer’s study will investigate older adults ages 75+ who maintain normal cognition and walk as fast as people 30 years younger, who they have termed as “fast-moving SuperAgers.”
The New Innovator Award noted that Minnesota's unusually robust population of healthy, active older adults, combined with the University of Minnesota's advanced research infrastructure, provides a unique environment for execution of this study.
The findings will inform targeted treatments and preventative interventions to maintain cognitive and physical function throughout aging.