As we age, our brains naturally shrink a bit, and with that comes the usual forgetfulness, names, dates, where you put your keys. It’s just part of getting older. But then there are the rare few known as “SuperAgers.” These folks, often in their 80s or beyond, somehow hold onto crystal-clear memories like they’re still in their 40s. Their brains don’t just age well, they push back hard. While most of us struggle to remember what we had for lunch yesterday, SuperAgers are out here recalling details from decades ago like it happened last week. Pretty wild, right?
“Superaging,” is a term coined at the Northwestern Alzheimer's Disease Research Center (ADRC) to define persons ≥ 80 years with delayed word recall raw scores at least equal to those of individuals 20 to 30 years younger. Superagers have fewer Alzheimer's disease–type changes in the brain.
Meet Carol Seigler, a superager as she turns 90
Carol Siegler, who lives in the Chicago suburb of Palatine, is a SuperAger. At 82, she won the American Crossword Puzzle Tournament for her age group, which she said she entered “as a gag," CNN reported.
According to Tamar Gefen, an associate professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at the Mesulam Institute for Cognitive Neurology and Alzheimer’s Disease at Northwestern University in Chicago,Siegler is still going strong, well on her way to her 90th birthday.
What's the secret of superagers?
Gefen, conducts research at Northwestern’s SuperAging Program that is currently studying 113 SuperAgers told CNN that the cingulate cortex, which is the part of the brain responsible for attention, motivation, and cognitive engagement, is thicker in superagers. "In the hippocampus, the memory center of the brain, we found SuperAgers have three times fewer tau tangles when compared to their “normal” peers. Abnormal formations of tau proteins are one of the key signs of Alzheimer’s," he added.
"These superagers maintain good brain morphology, tend to be gregarious, appear resistant to neurofibrillary degeneration and resilient to its consequences, have a more robust cholinergic system, carry more von Economo neurons, and have less inflammatory microglial activity in the white matter," Gefen wrote in a research paper which was released on Thursday in the journal of the Alzheimer’s Association.
How do superagers react to stress?
"Compared with the brain of same-age peers, SuperAgers have fewer activated microglia, the resident immune cells of the brain, in their white matter. White matter is the brain’s super highway, transporting information from one part of the brain to another," explains Gefen. "The brain of a SuperAger, however, has fewer activated microglia. In fact, the levels of microglia were on par with people in their 30s, 40s and 50s. That could mean there is less junk or disease in the brain of a SuperAger so the microglia have no need to be active," he added.
Microglia are like the brain’s built-in cleanup crew and security team rolled into one. These tiny, special immune cells hang out in your brain and spinal cord, always on the lookout for trouble. If something’s off—like damaged cells, infections, or random junk that doesn’t belong—microglia jump into action. They gobble up debris, fight off invaders, and even help keep neurons healthy. Think of them as the brain's mini bodyguards and janitors. But here’s the twist: when microglia go rogue or stay active for too long (like during chronic stress or aging), they can actually cause more harm than good, triggering inflammation or damaging healthy brain cells. Scientists are now learning how important these little guys are not just for brain health, but also in conditions like Alzheimer’s, depression, and multiple sclerosis. So yeah, microglia may be tiny, but they’re kind of a big deal when it comes to your brain.
In the future, deeper characterization of the superaging phenotype may lead to interventions that enhance resistance and resilience to involutional changes considered part of average (i.e., “normal”) brain aging, Gefen says in the research paper.
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