Aging effect in pattern, motion and cognitive visual evoked potentials

An electrophysiological study on the effect of aging on the visual pathway and various levels of visual information processing (primary cortex, associate visual motion processing cortex and cognitive cortical areas) was performed. We examined visual evoked potentials (VEPs) to pattern-reversal, motion-onset (translation and radial motion) and visual stimuli with a cognitive task (cognitive VEPs - P300 wave) at luminance of 17 cd/m(2). The most significant age-related change in a group of 150 healthy volunteers (15-85 years of age) was the increase in the P300 wave latency (2 ms per 1 year of age). Delays of the motion-onset VEPs (0.47 ms/year in translation and 0.46 ms/year in radial motion) and the pattern-reversal VEPs (0.26 ms/year) and the reductions of their amplitudes with increasing subject age (primarily in P300) were also found to be significant. The amplitude of the motion-onset VEPs to radial motion remained the most constant parameter with increasing age. Age-related changes were stronger in males. Our results indicate that cognitive VEPs, despite larger variability of their parameters, could be a useful criterion for an objective evaluation of the aging processes within the CNS. Possible differences in aging between the motion-processing system and the form-processing system within the visual pathway might be indicated by the more pronounced delay in the motion-onset VEPs and by their preserved size for radial motion (a biologically significant variant of motion) compared to the changes in pattern-reversal VEPs.

[1]  D. Kilic,et al.  The effects of ageing and sulfur dioxide inhalation exposure on visual-evoked potentials, antioxidant enzyme systems, and lipid-peroxidation levels of the brain and eye. , 2003, Neurotoxicology and teratology.

[2]  Jan Kremláček,et al.  Motion-onset VEPs to translating, radial, rotating and spiral stimuli , 2004, Documenta Ophthalmologica.

[3]  Jan Kremláček,et al.  Influence of physiological changes of glycaemia on VEPs and visual ERPs. , 2005, Physiological research.

[4]  Helmut Remschmidt,et al.  Motion-onset VEPs in dyslexia. Evidence for visual perceptual deficit , 2004, Neuroreport.

[5]  Michael A. Crognale,et al.  Differential aging of chromatic and achromatic visual pathways: behavior and electrophysiology , 2005, Vision Research.

[6]  Peter Martus,et al.  Motion‐Evoked Pattern Visual Evoked Potentials in Glaucoma , 2000, Journal of glaucoma.

[7]  M. Kuba,et al.  Visual evoked potentials specific for motion onset , 2004, Documenta Ophthalmologica.

[8]  S. Heinrich.  A primer on motion visual evoked potentials , 2007, Documenta Ophthalmologica.

[9]  Elger L. Abrahamse,et al.  Cognitive Processing in New and Practiced Discrete Keying Sequences , 2010, Front. Psychology.

[10]  L. Vaina.  Complex motion perception and its deficits , 1998, Current Opinion in Neurobiology.

[11]  Charles J. Duffy,et al.  Distinct visual motion processing impairments in aging and Alzheimer’s disease , 2011, Vision Research.

[12]  David C. Burr,et al.  The effects of ageing on the pattern electroretinogram and visual evoked potential in humans , 1991, Vision Research.

[13]  Jan Kremláček,et al.  Photopic and scotopic VEPs in patients with congenital stationary night-blindness , 2004, Documenta Ophthalmologica.

[14]  Michael Bach,et al.  Adaptation characteristics of steady-state motion visual evoked potentials , 2003, Clinical Neurophysiology.

[15]  Steven A. Hillyard,et al.  Identification of the neural sources of the pattern-reversal VEP , 2005, NeuroImage.

[16]  Michael Bach,et al.  Motion adaptation governs the shape of motion-evoked cortical potentials , 1994, Vision Research.

[17]  M. Valis,et al.  Visual evoked potentials to pattern, motion and cognitive stimuli in Alzheimer’s disease , 2010, Documenta Ophthalmologica.

[18]  M Kuba,et al.  Electrophysiological testing of dyslexia. , 2001, Acta medica.

[19]  Guillaume A. Rousselet,et al.  Healthy Aging Delays Scalp EEG Sensitivity to Noise in a Face Discrimination Task , 2010, Front. Psychology.

[20]  C. Blakemore,et al.  Is the motion system relatively spared in amblyopia? Evidence from cortical evoked responses , 1996, Vision Research.

[21]  Michael Bach,et al.  Contrast dependency of motion-onset and pattern-reversal VEPs: Interaction of stimulus type, recording site and response component , 1997, Vision Research.

[22]  J. Polich.  Updating P300: An integrative theory of P3a and P3b , 2007, Clinical Neurophysiology.

[23]  Vision Research , 1961, Nature.

[24]  Colin Blakemore,et al.  Contrast dependence of motion-onset and pattern-reversal evoked potentials , 1995, Vision Research.

[25]  Shozo Tobimatsu,et al.  Visual evoked potentials in school children: A comparative study of transient and steady-state methods with pattern reversal and flash stimulation , 1999, Clinical Neurophysiology.

[26]  Daphne L. McCulloch,et al.  A VEP investigation of parallel visual pathway development in primary school age children , 2004, Documenta Ophthalmologica.

[27]  J. Polich,et al.  Meta-analysis of P300 normative aging studies. , 1996, Psychophysiology.

[28]  Motion-onset visual evoked potentials improve the diagnosis of glaucoma , 1996, Documenta Ophthalmologica.

[29]  M. Kuba,et al.  Motion-onset VEPs reflect long maturation and early aging of visual motion-processing system , 2006, Vision Research.

[30]  Jan Kremláček,et al.  Within-session reproducibility of motion-onset VEPs: Effect of adaptation/habituation or fatigue on N2 peak amplitude and latency , 2007, Documenta Ophthalmologica.

[31]  J. Peregrin,et al.  Visual evoked potential evidence for magnocellular system deficit in dyslexia. , 1996, Physiological research.

[32]  Ryusuke Kakigi,et al.  Optimum stimulus size for the human brain to respond to motion: A magnetoencephalographic study , 2011, Clinical Neurophysiology.

[33]  M. Kuba,et al.  Motion-onset VEPs: Characteristics, methods, and diagnostic use , 2007, Vision Research.

[34]  C. Owsley.  Aging and vision , 2011, Vision Research.

[35]  J. W. Howe,et al.  Visual evoked potentials in the older population: age and gender effects. , 1987, Clinical physics and physiological measurement : an official journal of the Hospital Physicists' Association, Deutsche Gesellschaft fur Medizinische Physik and the European Federation of Organisations for Medical Physics.

[36]  M. Štrucl,et al.  Age-related changes in the relationship between visual evoked potentials and visually evoked cerebral blood flow velocity response. , 2005, Functional neurology.

[37]  D. Burr,et al.  Visual Ageing: Unspecific Decline of the Responses to Luminance and Colour , 1996, Vision Research.

[38]  M. Kuba,et al.  Effect of stimulus localisation on motion-onset VEP , 2004, Vision Research.

[39]  R Kakigi,et al.  Visual evoked magnetic responses to central and peripheral stimulation: simultaneous VEP recordings. , 1998, Brain topography.

[40]  Krystel R. Huxlin,et al.  Motion-onset visual evoked potentials predict performance during a global direction discrimination task , 2010, Neuropsychologia.