Resting heart rate (variability) and cognition relationships reveal cognitively healthy individuals with pathological amyloid/tau ratio

Figure 1. MMSE and resting HR. (A) MMSE negatively correlated with resting heart rate in CH-PATs (r = −0.57, p = 0.002, red cross), but not in CH-NATs (r = 0.07, p = 0.71, green circle). (B) Correlation was not significant in all CH (r = −0.09, p = 0.57, green circle), MCI (r = −0.14, p = 0.41, red cross), or AD individuals (−0.11, p = 0.59, blue star). AD, Alzheimer’s disease; CH, cognitively health; CH-NAT, cognitively healthy individuals with a normal amyloid/tau ratio; CH-PAT, cognitively healthy individuals with a pathological amyloid/tau ratio; HR, heart rate; MCI, mild cognitive impairment; MMSE, mini-mental state exam.

Figure 2. Resting HR and alpha power during Stroop testing incongruent trials. In CH-NATs, resting HR (before the Stroop) negatively correlated with alpha ERD at the frontal region (Fi, A) and at the central region (Ci, B). In CH-PATs, but positively correlated with alpha ERD (Ci) in CH-PATs, resting HR positively correlated with alpha ERD at the frontal region (Fi, C) and at the central region (Ci, D). CH-NAT, cognitively healthy individuals with a normal amyloid/tau ratio; CH-PAT, cognitively healthy individuals with a pathological amyloid/tau ratio; ERD, event-related desynchronization; HR, heart rate.

Figure 3. Resting HRV associated with task-switching performance. Resting RMSSD positively correlated with accuracy during switch trials in CH-NATs (A), but not in CH-PATs (B). ACCsw, accuracy during switch trials; CH-NAT, cognitively healthy individuals with a normal amyloid/tau ratio; CH-PAT, cognitively healthy individuals with a pathological amyloid/tau ratio; HRV, heart rate variability; RMSSD, root mean squared of successive differences.