title: Resting-state anticorrelations between medial and lateral prefrontal cortex: association with working memory, aging, and individual differences.
abstract: We examined how variation in working memory (WM) capacity due to aging or individual differences among young adults is associated with intrinsic or resting-state anticorrelations, particularly between (1) the medial prefrontal cortex (MPFC), a component of the default-mode network (DMN) that typically decreases in activation during external, attention-demanding tasks, and (2) the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC), a component of the fronto-parietal control network that supports executive functions and WM and typically increases in activation during attention-demanding tasks. We compared the magnitudes of MPFC-DLPFC anticorrelations between healthy younger and older participants (Experiment 1) and related the magnitudes of these anticorrelations to individual differences on two behavioral measures of WM capacity in two independent groups of young adults (Experiments 1 and 2). Relative to younger adults, older adults exhibited reductions in WM capacity and in MPFC-DLPFC anticorrelations. Within younger adults, greater MPFC-DLPFC anticorrelation at rest correlated with greater WM capacity. These findings show that variation in MPFC-DLPFC anticorrelations, whether related to aging or to individual differences, may reflect an intrinsic functional brain architecture supportive of WM capacity.
authors.affiliation: Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences and McGovern Institute for Brain Research, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, USA. Electronic address: jkeller1@mit.edu.
authors.forename: Joseph B
authors.initials: JB
authors.lastname: Keller
authors.affiliation: Athinoula A. Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging, Department of Radiology, Massachusetts General Hospital, Charlestown, MA, USA; Department of Radiology, Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA.
authors.forename: Trey
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Hedden
authors.affiliation: Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences and McGovern Institute for Brain Research, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, USA.
authors.forename: Todd W
authors.initials: TW
authors.lastname: Thompson
authors.affiliation: Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences and McGovern Institute for Brain Research, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, USA.
authors.forename: Sheeba A
authors.initials: SA
authors.lastname: Anteraper
authors.affiliation: Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences and McGovern Institute for Brain Research, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, USA; Institute for Medical Engineering & Science, Cambridge, MA, USA.
authors.forename: John D E
authors.initials: JD
authors.lastname: Gabrieli
authors.affiliation: Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences and McGovern Institute for Brain Research, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, USA.
authors.forename: Susan
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Whitfield-Gabrieli
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D000375:Aging / Q000502:physiology*; D001931:Brain Mapping; D005260:Female; D007839:Functional Laterality / Q000502:physiology*; D059907:Functional Neuroimaging; D006801:Humans; D007206:Individuality; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging; D008297:Male; D008570:Memory, Short-Term / Q000502:physiology*; D009415:Nerve Net / Q000502:physiology*; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests; D017397:Prefrontal Cortex / Q000502:physiology*; D011932:Reading; D012146:Rest / Q000502:physiology*; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: Aging; Default mode network; Functional connectivity; Resting-state fMRI; Working memory