Stiffer brain arteries linked to poorer cognition in old mice
A randomized experiment in 16 older mice found no reduction in artery stiffness or improvement in cognition with four months of alagebrium chloride versus water.
4 months
Limit: Nest building was used as a proxy for cognition
Edited by Boris Djordjevic · AgingResearch.News
In 16 male and female C57BL/6 mice aged 20 months, researchers tested alagebrium chloride, a drug intended to break links in collagen, a structural protein. They randomly assigned eight mice per group to the drug or water. They gave the drug at 1 milligram per kilogram of body weight daily by mouth for three weeks, followed by one week off, over 16 weeks.
The drug did not significantly reduce stiffness in large arteries or brain arteries. It did not improve the ability of brain-artery linings to help vessels widen. Cognitive test results and collagen links also did not change. Across both groups, stiffer brain arteries were linked to poorer nest building, used to assess cognition, and poorer artery-lining function.
Why it matters
The authors suggested that brain-artery stiffness may be a promising target for tackling age-related declines in brain blood-vessel function and cognition.
Caveats
The stiffness–cognition link was correlational and used nest building as a proxy for cognition. The experiment involved only 16 old mice, not people.
- Alagebrium
- Extracellular matrix remodeling
- Arterial stiffness
- Cerebrovascular dysfunction
- Cognitive decline
- Mice
The paper
University of Oregon
Physiological Reports, Jun 2026, Open access
