| 1. |
- Ahmad, Shahzad, et al.
(författare)
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CDH6 and HAGH protein levels in plasma associate with Alzheimer’s disease in APOE ε4 carriers
- 2020
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Ingår i: Scientific Reports. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 2045-2322. ; 10:1
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Many Alzheimer’s disease (AD) genes including Apolipoprotein E (APOE) are found to be expressed in blood-derived macrophages and thus may alter blood protein levels. We measured 91 neuro-proteins in plasma from 316 participants of the Rotterdam Study (incident AD = 161) using Proximity Extension Ligation assay. We studied the association of plasma proteins with AD in the overall sample and stratified by APOE. Findings from the Rotterdam study were replicated in 186 AD patients of the BioFINDER study. We further evaluated the correlation of these protein biomarkers with total tau (t-tau), phosphorylated tau (p-tau) and amyloid-beta (Aβ) 42 levels in cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) in the Amsterdam Dementia Cohort (N = 441). Finally, we conducted a genome-wide association study (GWAS) to identify the genetic variants determining the blood levels of AD-associated proteins. Plasma levels of the proteins, CDH6 (β = 0.638, P = 3.33 × 10−4) and HAGH (β = 0.481, P = 7.20 × 10−4), were significantly elevated in APOE ε4 carrier AD patients. The findings in the Rotterdam Study were replicated in the BioFINDER study for both CDH6 (β = 1.365, P = 3.97 × 10−3) and HAGH proteins (β = 0.506, P = 9.31 × 10−7) when comparing cases and controls in APOE ε4 carriers. In the CSF, CDH6 levels were positively correlated with t-tau and p-tau in the total sample as well as in APOE ε4 stratum (P < 1 × 10−3). The HAGH protein was not detected in CSF. GWAS of plasma CDH6 protein levels showed significant association with a cis-regulatory locus (rs111283466, P = 1.92 × 10−9). CDH6 protein is implicated in cell adhesion and synaptogenesis while HAGH protein is related to the oxidative stress pathway. Our findings suggest that these pathways may be altered during presymptomatic AD and that CDH6 and HAGH may be new blood-based biomarkers.
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| 2. |
- Arvidsson, Ida, et al.
(författare)
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Comparing a pre-defined versus deep learning approach for extracting brain atrophy patterns to predict cognitive decline due to Alzheimer’s disease in patients with mild cognitive symptoms
- 2024
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Ingår i: Alzheimer's Research and Therapy. - 1758-9193. ; 16:1
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Background: Predicting future Alzheimer’s disease (AD)-related cognitive decline among individuals with subjective cognitive decline (SCD) or mild cognitive impairment (MCI) is an important task for healthcare. Structural brain imaging as measured by magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) could potentially contribute when making such predictions. It is unclear if the predictive performance of MRI can be improved using entire brain images in deep learning (DL) models compared to using pre-defined brain regions. Methods: A cohort of 332 individuals with SCD/MCI were included from the Swedish BioFINDER-1 study. The goal was to predict longitudinal SCD/MCI-to-AD dementia progression and change in Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) over four years. Four models were evaluated using different predictors: (1) clinical data only, including demographics, cognitive tests and APOE ε4 status, (2) clinical data plus hippocampal volume, (3) clinical data plus all regional MRI gray matter volumes (N = 68) extracted using FreeSurfer software, (4) a DL model trained using multi-task learning with MRI images, Jacobian determinant images and baseline cognition as input. A double cross-validation scheme, with five test folds and for each of those ten validation folds, was used. External evaluation was performed on part of the ADNI dataset, including 108 patients. Mann-Whitney U-test was used to determine statistically significant differences in performance, with p-values less than 0.05 considered significant. Results: In the BioFINDER cohort, 109 patients (33%) progressed to AD dementia. The performance of the clinical data model for prediction of progression to AD dementia was area under the curve (AUC) = 0.85 and four-year cognitive decline was R2 = 0.14. The performance was improved for both outcomes when adding hippocampal volume (AUC = 0.86, R2 = 0.16). Adding FreeSurfer brain regions improved prediction of four-year cognitive decline but not progression to AD (AUC = 0.83, R2 = 0.17), while the DL model worsened the performance for both outcomes (AUC = 0.84, R2 = 0.08). A sensitivity analysis showed that the Jacobian determinant image was more informative than the MRI image, but that performance was maximized when both were included. In the external evaluation cohort from ADNI, 23 patients (21%) progressed to AD dementia. The results for predicted progression to AD dementia were similar to the results for the BioFINDER test data, while the performance for the cognitive decline was deteriorated. Conclusions: The DL model did not significantly improve the prediction of clinical disease progression in AD, compared to regression models with a single pre-defined brain region.
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| 3. |
- Ashton, Nicholas J., et al.
(författare)
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Differential roles of Aβ42/40, p-tau231 and p-tau217 for Alzheimer's trial selection and disease monitoring.
- 2022
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Ingår i: Nature medicine. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 1546-170X .- 1078-8956. ; 28:12, s. 2555-2562
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Blood biomarkers indicative of Alzheimer's disease (AD) pathology are altered in both preclinical and symptomatic stages of the disease. Distinctive biomarkers may be optimal for the identification of AD pathology or monitoring of disease progression. Blood biomarkers that correlate with changes in cognition and atrophy during the course of the disease could be used in clinical trials to identify successful interventions and thereby accelerate the development of efficient therapies. When disease-modifying treatments become approved for use, efficient blood-based biomarkers might also inform on treatment implementation and management in clinical practice. In the BioFINDER-1 cohort, plasma phosphorylated (p)-tau231 and amyloid-β42/40 ratio were more changed at lower thresholds of amyloid pathology. Longitudinally, however, only p-tau217 demonstrated marked amyloid-dependent changes over 4-6years in both preclinical and symptomatic stages of the disease, with no such changes observed in p-tau231, p-tau181, amyloid-β42/40, glial acidic fibrillary protein or neurofilament light. Only longitudinal increases of p-tau217 were also associated with clinical deterioration and brain atrophy in preclinical AD. The selective longitudinal increase of p-tau217 and its associations with cognitive decline and atrophy was confirmed in an independent cohort (Wisconsin Registry for Alzheimer's Prevention). These findings support the differential association of plasma biomarkers with disease development and strongly highlight p-tau217 as a surrogate marker of disease progression in preclinical and prodromal AD, with impact for the development of new disease-modifying treatments.
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| 4. |
- Barthélemy, Nicolas R, et al.
(författare)
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Highly Accurate Blood Test for Alzheimer's Disease Comparable or Superior to Clinical CSF Tests
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Ingår i: Nature Medicine. - 1546-170X.
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- With the emergence of Alzheimer's disease (AD) disease-modifying therapies, identifying patients who could benefit from these treatments becomes critical. We evaluated whether a precise blood test could perform as well as established cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) tests in detecting amyloid-β (Aβ) plaques and tau tangles. Plasma %p-tau217 (ratio of phosporylated-tau217 to non-phosphorylated tau) was analyzed by mass spectrometry in the Swedish BioFINDER-2 cohort (n=1,422) and the US Knight ADRC cohort (n=337). Matched CSF samples were analyzed with clinically used and FDA-approved automated immunoassays for Aβ42/40 and p-tau181/Aβ42. The primary and secondary outcomes were detection of brain Aβ or tau pathology, respectively, using PET imaging as the reference standard. Main analyses were focused on individuals with cognitive impairment (mild cognitive impairment and mild dementia), which is the target population for available disease-modifying treatments. Plasma %p-tau217 was clinically equivalent to FDA-approved CSF tests in classifying Aβ PET status, with an area-under-the-curve (AUC) for both between 0.95-0.97. Plasma %p-tau217 was generally superior to CSF tests in classification of tau-PET with AUCs of 0.95-0.98. In cognitively impaired sub-cohorts (BioFINDER-2: n=720; Knight ADRC: n=50), plasma %p-tau217 had an accuracy, positive predictive value and negative predictive value of 89-90% for Aβ PET and 87-88% for tau-PET status, which was clinically equivalent to CSF tests, further improving to 95% using a two cut-off approach. Blood plasma %p-tau217 demonstrated performance clinically equivalent or superior to clinically used FDA-approved CSF tests in the detection of AD pathology. Use of high performance blood tests in clinical practice can improve access to accurate AD diagnosis and AD-specific treatments.
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| 5. |
- Baumeister, Hannah, et al.
(författare)
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A generalizable data-driven model of atrophy heterogeneity and progression in memory clinic settings
- 2024
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Ingår i: Brain : a journal of neurology. - 1460-2156. ; 147:7, s. 2400-2413
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Memory clinic patients are a heterogeneous population representing various aetiologies of pathological aging. It is unknown if divergent spatiotemporal progression patterns of brain atrophy, as previously described in Alzheimer's disease (AD) patients, are prevalent and clinically meaningful in this group of older adults. To uncover distinct atrophy subtypes, we applied the Subtype and Stage Inference (SuStaIn) algorithm to baseline structural MRI data from 813 participants enrolled in the DELCODE cohort (mean ± SD age = 70.67 ± 6.07 years, 52% females). Participants were cognitively unimpaired (CU; n = 285) or fulfilled diagnostic criteria for subjective cognitive decline (SCD; n = 342), mild cognitive impairment (MCI; n = 118), or dementia of the Alzheimer's type (n = 68). Atrophy subtypes were compared in baseline demographics, fluid AD biomarker levels, the Preclinical Alzheimer Cognitive Composite (PACC-5), as well as episodic memory and executive functioning. PACC-5 trajectories over up to 240 weeks were examined. To test if baseline atrophy subtype and stage predicted clinical trajectories before manifest cognitive impairment, we analysed PACC-5 trajectories and MCI conversion rates of CU and SCD participants. Limbic-predominant and hippocampal-sparing atrophy subtypes were identified. Limbic-predominant atrophy first affected the medial temporal lobes, followed by further temporal and, finally, the remaining cortical regions. At baseline, this subtype was related to older age, more pathological AD biomarker levels, APOE ε4 carriership, and an amnestic cognitive impairment. Hippocampal-sparing atrophy initially occurred outside the temporal lobe with the medial temporal lobe spared up to advanced atrophy stages. This atrophy pattern also affected individuals with positive AD biomarkers and was associated with more generalised cognitive impairment. Limbic-predominant atrophy, in all and in only unimpaired participants, was linked to more negative longitudinal PACC-5 slopes than observed in participants without or with hippocampal-sparing atrophy and increased the risk of MCI conversion. SuStaIn modelling was repeated in a sample from the Swedish BioFINDER-2 cohort. Highly similar atrophy progression patterns and associated cognitive profiles were identified. Cross-cohort model generalizability, both on the subject and group level, were excellent, indicating reliable performance in previously unseen data. The proposed model is a promising tool for capturing heterogeneity among older adults at early at-risk states for AD in applied settings. The implementation of atrophy subtype- and stage-specific end-points may increase the statistical power of pharmacological trials targeting early AD.
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| 6. |
- Berron, David, et al.
(författare)
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Early stages of tau pathology and its associations with functional connectivity, atrophy and memory
- 2021
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Ingår i: Brain. - : Oxford University Press (OUP). - 0006-8950 .- 1460-2156. ; 144:9, s. 2771-2783
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- In Alzheimer's disease, post-mortem studies have shown that the first cortical site where neurofibrillary tangles appear is the transentorhinal region, a subregion within the medial temporal lobe that largely overlaps with Brodmann area 35, and the entorhinal cortex. Here we used tau-PET imaging to investigate the sequence of tau pathology progression within the human medial temporal lobe and across regions in the posterior-medial system. Our objective was to study how medial temporal tau is related to functional connectivity, regional atrophy, and memory performance. We included 215 amyloid-β- cognitively unimpaired, 81 amyloid-β+ cognitively unimpaired and 87 amyloid-β+ individuals with mild cognitive impairment, who each underwent 18F-RO948 tau and 18F-flutemetamol amyloid PET imaging, structural T1-MRI and memory assessments as part of the Swedish BioFINDER-2 study. First, event-based modelling revealed that the entorhinal cortex and Brodmann area 35 show the earliest signs of tau accumulation followed by the anterior and posterior hippocampus, Brodmann area 36 and the parahippocampal cortex. In later stages, tau accumulation became abnormal in neocortical temporal and finally parietal brain regions. Second, in cognitively unimpaired individuals, increased tau load was related to local atrophy in the entorhinal cortex, Brodmann area 35 and the anterior hippocampus and tau load in several anterior medial temporal lobe subregions was associated with distant atrophy of the posterior hippocampus. Tau load, but not atrophy, in these regions was associated with lower memory performance. Further, tau-related reductions in functional connectivity in critical networks between the medial temporal lobe and regions in the posterior-medial system were associated with this early memory impairment. Finally, in patients with mild cognitive impairment, the association of tau load in the hippocampus with memory performance was partially mediated by posterior hippocampal atrophy. In summary, our findings highlight the progression of tau pathology across medial temporal lobe subregions and its disease stage-specific association with memory performance. While tau pathology might affect memory performance in cognitively unimpaired individuals via reduced functional connectivity in critical medial temporal lobe-cortical networks, memory impairment in mild cognitively impaired patients is associated with posterior hippocampal atrophy.
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| 7. |
- Binette, Alexa Pichet, et al.
(författare)
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Amyloid-associated increases in soluble tau is a key driver in accumulation of tau aggregates and cognitive decline in early Alzheimer
- 2022
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Ingår i: Alzheimer's and Dementia. - : Wiley. - 1552-5260 .- 1552-5279. ; 18:S1
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Background: For optimal design of anti-amyloid-β (Aβ) and anti-tau clinical trials, it is important to understand how Aβ and soluble phosphorylated tau (p-tau) relate to the accumulation of tau aggregates assessed with positron emission tomography (PET) and subsequent cognitive decline across the Alzheimer's disease (AD) continuum. Method: We included 327 participants from the Swedish BioFINDER-2 cohort with cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) p-tau217, Aβ-PET, longitudinal tau-PET, and longitudinal cognition. The main groups of interest were Aβ-positive non-demented participants and AD dementia patients (Table 1 and Figure 1), and analyses were conducted separately in each group. First, we investigated how soluble p-tau217 and regional Aβ-PET were associated with tau-PET rate of change across the 200 brain parcels from the Schaefer atlas. We also tested the mediating effect of p-tau217 between Aβ-PET and tau-PET change. Second, we investigated how soluble p-tau217 and tau-PET change related to change in cognition, and mediation between these variables. Result: In early AD stages (non-demented participants), increased concentration of soluble p-tau217 was the main driver of accumulation of insoluble tau aggregates across the brain (measured as tau-PET rate of change), beyond the effect of regional Aβ-PET and baseline tau-PET (Figure 2A-C). Further, averaged across all regions, soluble p-tau217 mediated 54% of the association between Aβ and tau aggregation (Figure 2D). Higher soluble p-tau217 concentrations were also associated with cognitive decline, which was mediated by faster increase of tau aggregates (Figure 3). Repeating the same analyses in the AD dementia group, results were different. In late stage of AD, when Aβ fibrils and soluble p-tau levels have plateaued, soluble p-tau217 was not associated with accumulation of tau aggregates beyond baseline tau-PET (Figure 4A), and cognitive decline was driven by the accumulation rate of insoluble tau aggregates and not soluble p-tau217 (Figure 4B-C). Conclusion: Soluble p-tau is a main driver of tau aggregation and future cognitive decline in earlier stages of AD, whereas tau aggregation accumulation is more likely an important driver of disease in later stages. Overall, our data suggest that therapeutic approaches reducing soluble p-tau levels might be most favorable in early AD.
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| 8. |
- Blennow, Kaj, 1958, et al.
(författare)
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Predicting clinical decline and conversion to Alzheimer's disease or dementia using novel Elecsys Aβ(1-42), pTau and tTau CSF immunoassays.
- 2019
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Ingår i: Scientific reports. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 2045-2322. ; 9:1
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- We evaluated the performance of CSF biomarkers for predicting risk of clinical decline and conversion to dementia in non-demented patients with cognitive symptoms. CSF samples from patients in two multicentre longitudinal studies (ADNI, n=619; BioFINDER, n=431) were analysed. Aβ(1-42), tTau and pTau CSF concentrations were measured using Elecsys CSF immunoassays, and tTau/Aβ(1-42) and pTau/Aβ(1-42) ratios calculated. Patients were classified as biomarker (BM)-positive or BM-negative at baseline. Ability of biomarkers to predict risk of clinical decline and conversion to AD/dementia was assessed using pre-established cut-offs for Aβ(1-42) and ratios; tTau and pTau cut-offs were determined. BM-positive patients showed greater clinical decline than BM-negative patients, demonstrated by greater decreases in MMSE scores (all biomarkers: -2.10 to -0.70). Risk of conversion to AD/dementia was higher in BM-positive patients (HR: 1.67to11.48). Performance of Tau/Aβ(1-42) ratios was superior to single biomarkers, and consistent even when using cut-offs derived in a different cohort. Optimal pTau and tTau cut-offs were approximately 27pg/mL and 300pg/mL in both BioFINDER and ADNI. Elecsys pTau/Aβ(1-42) and tTau/Aβ(1-42) are robust biomarkers for predicting risk of clinical decline and conversion to dementia in non-demented patients, and may support AD diagnosis in clinical practice.
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| 9. |
- Cicognola, Claudia, et al.
(författare)
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Associations of CSF PDGFRβ With Aging, Blood-Brain Barrier Damage, Neuroinflammation, and Alzheimer Disease Pathologic Changes
- 2023
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Ingår i: Neurology. - 1526-632X. ; 101:1, s. 30-39
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: Injured pericytes in the neurovascular unit release platelet-derived growth factor β (PDGFRβ) into the cerebrospinal fluid (CSF). However, it is not clear how pericyte injury contributes to Alzheimer's disease (AD)-related changes and blood brain barrier (BBB) damage. We aimed to test if CSF PDGFRβ was associated with different AD- and age-associated pathological changes leading to dementia.METHODS: PDGFRβ was measured in the CSF of 771 cognitively unimpaired (CU, n=408), mild cognitive impairment (MCI, n=175) and dementia subjects (n=188) from the Swedish BioFINDER-2 cohort. We then checked association Aβ-PET and tau-PET SUVR, APOE ε4 genotype and MRI measurements of cortical thickness, white matter lesions (WML) and cerebral blood flow (CBF). We also analysed the role of CSF PDGFRβ in the relationship between aging, BBB dysfunction (measured by CSF/plasma albumin ratio, QAlb) and neuroinflammation (i.e., CSF levels of YKL-40 and glial fibrillary acidic protein [GFAP], preferentially expressed in reactive astrocytes). RESULTS: The cohort had a mean age of 67 years (CU=62.8, MCI=69.9, dementia=70.4) and 50.1% were male (CU=46.6%, MCI=53.7%, dementia=54.3%). Higher CSF PDGFRβ concentrations were related to higher age (b=19.1, β=0.5, 95% CI=16-22.2, p<0.001), increased CSF neuroinflammatory markers of glial activation YKL-40 (b=3.4, β=0.5, 95% CI=2.8-3.9, p<0.001) and GFAP (b=27.4, β=0.4, 95% CI=20.9-33.9, p<0.001), and worse BBB integrity measured by QAlb (b=37.4, β=0.2, 95% CI=24.9-49.9, p<0.001). Age was also associated with worse BBB integrity, and this was partly mediated by PDGFRβ and neuroinflammatory markers (16-33% of total effect). However, PDGFRβ showed no associations with APOE ε4 genotype, PET imaging of Aβ and tau pathology or MRI measures of brain atrophy and white matter lesions (p>0.05).DISCUSSION: In summary, pericyte damage, reflected by CSF PDGFRβ, may be involved in age-related BBB disruption together with neuroinflammation, but is not related to Alzheimer-related pathological changes.
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| 10. |
- Cullen, Nicholas, et al.
(författare)
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Association of CSF Aβ38Levels with Risk of Alzheimer Disease-Related Decline
- 2022
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Ingår i: Neurology. - 0028-3878. ; 98:9, s. 958-967
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Background and ObjectiveExperimental studies suggest that the balance between short and long β-amyloid (Aβ) species might modulate the toxic effects of Aβ in Alzheimer disease (AD), but clinical evidence is lacking. We studied whether Aβ38 levels in CSF relate to risk of AD dementia and cognitive decline.MethodsCSF Aβ38 levels were measured in 656 individuals across 2 clinical cohorts: the Swedish BioFINDER study and the Alzheimer's Disease Neuroimaging Initiative (ADNI). Cox regression models were used to evaluate the association between baseline Aβ38 levels and risk of AD dementia in AD biomarker-positive individuals (AD+; determined by CSF phosphorylated tau [P-tau]/Aβ42 ratio) with subjective cognitive decline (SCD) or mild cognitive impairment (MCI). Linear mixed-effects models were used to evaluate the association between baseline Aβ38 levels and cognitive decline as measured by the Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) in AD+ participants with SCD, MCI, or AD dementia.ResultsIn the BioFINDER cohort, high Aβ38 levels were associated with slower decline in MMSE score (β = 0.30 points per SD, p = 0.001) and with lower risk of conversion to AD dementia (hazard ratio 0.83 per SD, p = 0.03). In the ADNI cohort, higher Aβ38 levels were associated with less decline in MMSE score (β = 0.27, p = 0.01) but not risk of conversion to AD dementia (p = 0.66). Aβ38 levels in both cohorts were significantly associated with both cognitive and clinical outcomes when further adjusted for CSF P-tau or CSF Aβ42 levels.DiscussionHigher CSF Aβ38 levels are associated with lower risk of AD-related changes in 2 independent clinical cohorts. These findings suggest that γ-secretase modulators could be effective as disease-altering therapy.Trial Registration InformationClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT03174938.
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