Centre for Human Brain Health lecture series: fMRI across the lifespan: is it good enough to be BOLD?

Abstract: The maintenance of wellbeing across the lifespan depends on the preservation of cognitive function. Successful cognitive ageing requires precise regulation of activity and connectivity within and between large-scale functional brain networks. Such activity and connectivity can be estimated from task-based and task-free functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI).  However, common approaches to the analysis of fMRI data are confounded by age-related changes in neurovascular signalling. Furthermore, previous studies have typically separated the evaluation of differences in activity of focal brain regions from differences in the interactions between them. In this talk, I will demonstrate examples of recent developments that aim to refine current approaches and enhance the ability to investigate resilience or disorder of brain dynamics across the lifespan.