About me
Jonas Persson received his PhD from Umeå University in 2002. After a one-year post doc, also at Umeå University, he spent three years as an international research fellow at the Department of Psychology, University of Michigan. From 2008 he has been heading an independent research group on the neural basis for cognition and aging at the Department of Psychology, Stockholm University, which has been funded by the Swedish Science Council. During that period he also became an associate professor at the Department of Psychology, Stockholm University.
Jonas Persson is currently a senior researcher at the Aging Research Center (ARC) and Deputy Head of Division. His research primarily deals with the interaction between brain structure-function and higher cognitive functions in aging, with a particular focus on memory (episodic/working memory) and executive control functions. These questions are addressed by means of structural (brain anatomy) and functional (brain function) MRI and measures of cognitive performance.
Research description
• Functional neuroimaging of higher cognitive functions, such as cognitive control, working memory, and episodic memory.
• Differences in neural responses between young and older adults, and its implications for cognitive decline in old age.
• Age-related changes in the structure of the brain, including white-matter changes (as assessed by diffusion-tensor imaging), and volumetric changes.
• Structure – function correlates related to increased genetic risk for developing Alzheimer’s disease.
Recent publications:
1. Becker, N., Kalpouzos, G., Persson, J., Laukka, EJ., and Brehmer, Y. (in press) Differential effects of encoding instructions on brain activity patterns of item and associative memory. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience. 2. Szymkowicz, SM., Persson, J., Lin, T., Fischer, H., and Ebner, N. (in press) Hippocampal brain volume is associated with faster facial emotion identification in older adults: preliminary results. Frontiers in Aging Neuroscience. 3. Peira, N., Ziaei, M., and Persson, J. (2016). Age differences in brain systems supporting transient and sustained processes involved in prospective memory and working memory. NeuroImage. 125: 745-755. 4. Mattsson, P., Forsberg, A., Persson, J., Nyberg, L., Nilsson, LG., Halldin, C., and Farde, L. (2015). β-amyloid binding in elderly subjects with declining or stable episodic memory function measured with PET and [11C]AZD2184. European Journal of Nuclear Medicine and Molecular Imaging. 42(10): 1507-1511. 5. Papenberg, G., Salami, R., Persson, J., Lindenberger, U., and Bäckman, L. (2015). Genetics and Functional Imaging: Effects of APOE, BDNF, COMT, and KIBRA in Aging. Neuropsychology Review. 25 (1): 47-62. 6. Persson, J., Rieckmann, A., Kalpouzos, G., Fischer, H., and Bäckman, L. (2015). Influences of a DRD2 polymorphism on updating of long-term memory representations and caudate BOLD activity: Magnification in aging. Human Brain Mapping. 36 (4): 1325-1334. 7. Pudas S, Persson, J, Nilsson LG, Nyberg L. (2014). Midlife memory ability accounts for brain activity differences in healthy aging. Neurobiology of Aging. (35) 11: 2495-503.
8. Persson, J., Pudas, S., Nilsson, LG., & Nyberg, L. (2014). Longitudinal assessment of default-mode function in aging. Neurobiology of Aging. 35 (9):2107-2117. 9. Kauppi K, Nilsson LG, Persson J, Nyberg L. (2014) Additive genetic effect of APOE and BDNF on hippocampus activity. Neuroimage. (89):306-313. 10. Nyberg L, Andersson M, Kauppi K, Lundquist A, Persson J, Pudas S, Nilsson LG. (2014) Age-related and Genetic Modulation of Frontal Cortex Efficiency. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience. (4):746-54 11. Ziaei, M., Peira, N., Persson., J. (2014). Brain systems underlying attentional control and emotional distraction during working memory encoding. Neuroimage. (87): 276-286. 12. Martina Hedenius, Jonas Persson, Per A. Alm, Michael T. Ullman, James H. Howard Jr., Darlene V. Howard, Margareta Jennische (2013). Impaired Implicit Sequence Learning in Children with Developmental Dyslexia. Research in Developmental Disabilities, 34, 3924–3935. 13. Hedenius, M., Ullman, M. T., Alm, P., Jennische, M., and Persson, J. (2013). Enhanced declarative memory in children with dyslexia. 8 (5): e63998. PLoS ONE. 14. Pudas, S., Persson, J., Josefsson, M., de Luna, X., Nilsson, LG., Nyberg, L. (2013). Brain characteristics of individuals resisting age-related cognitive decline over two decades. Journal of Neuroscience. 33 (20): 8668-8677. 15. Persson, J., Larsson, A., & Reuter-Lorenz, P. A. (2013). Imaging fatigue of interference control reveals the neural basis of executive resource depletion. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 25 (3): 338-51. 16. Arshamian, A., Iannilli, E., Gerber, JC., Willander, J., Persson, J., Seo, H-S., Hummel, T. & Larsson, M. (2013) The functional neuroanatomy of odor evoked autobiographical memories cued by odors and words. Neuropsychologia, 51 (1): 123-131. 17. Marklund, P., & Persson, J. (2012). Context-dependent switching between proactive and reactive working memory control mechanisms in the right inferior frontal gyrus. Neuroimage. 63, 1552-1560. 18. Persson, J., Pudas, S., Lind, J., Kauppi, K., Nilsson, LG., & Nyberg, L. (2012). Longitudinal structure – function correlates in elderly reveal MTL dysfunction with cognitive decline. Cerebral Cortex, 22 (10): 2297-2304. 19. Kalpouzos, G., Persson, J., Nyberg, L. (2012). Local brain atrophy accounts for functional activity differences in normal aging. Neurobiology of Aging. 33 (3) 623.e1-623.e13. 20. Hedenius, M., Persson, J., Tremblay, A., Adi-Japha, E., Veríssimo, J., Dye, C.D., Alm, P., Jennische, M., Tomblin, B.J, Ullman, M.T. (2011). Grammar predicts procedural learning and consolidation deficits in children with Specific Language Impairment. Research in Developmental Disilibities. 32 (6): 2362-2375. 21. Persson, J., Kalpouzos G., Nilsson, L-G, Ryberg M., Nyberg, L. (2011). Preserved hippocampus activation in normal aging as revealed by fMRI. Hippocampus. 21 (7): 753-766.