| 1. |
- Wuestefeld, Anika, et al.
(författare)
-
Comparison of histological delineations of medial temporal lobe cortices by four independent neuroanatomy laboratories
-
Ingår i: Hippocampus. - 1050-9631.
-
Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- The medial temporal lobe (MTL) cortex, located adjacent to the hippocampus, is crucial for memory and prone to the accumulation of certain neuropathologies such as Alzheimer's disease neurofibrillary tau tangles. The MTL cortex is composed of several subregions which differ in their functional and cytoarchitectonic features. As neuroanatomical schools rely on different cytoarchitectonic definitions of these subregions, it is unclear to what extent their delineations of MTL cortex subregions overlap. Here, we provide an overview of cytoarchitectonic definitions of the entorhinal and parahippocampal cortices as well as Brodmann areas (BA) 35 and 36, as provided by four neuroanatomists from different laboratories, aiming to identify the rationale for overlapping and diverging delineations. Nissl-stained series were acquired from the temporal lobes of three human specimens (two right and one left hemisphere). Slices (50 μm thick) were prepared perpendicular to the long axis of the hippocampus spanning the entire longitudinal extent of the MTL cortex. Four neuroanatomists annotated MTL cortex subregions on digitized slices spaced 5 mm apart (pixel size 0.4 μm at 20× magnification). Parcellations, terminology, and border placement were compared among neuroanatomists. Cytoarchitectonic features of each subregion are described in detail. Qualitative analysis of the annotations showed higher agreement in the definitions of the entorhinal cortex and BA35, while the definitions of BA36 and the parahippocampal cortex exhibited less overlap among neuroanatomists. The degree of overlap of cytoarchitectonic definitions was partially reflected in the neuroanatomists' agreement on the respective delineations. Lower agreement in annotations was observed in transitional zones between structures where seminal cytoarchitectonic features are expressed less saliently. The results highlight that definitions and parcellations of the MTL cortex differ among neuroanatomical schools and thereby increase understanding of why these differences may arise. This work sets a crucial foundation to further advance anatomically-informed neuroimaging research on the human MTL cortex.
|
|
| 2. |
- Ashton, Nicholas J., et al.
(författare)
-
An update on blood-based biomarkers for non-Alzheimer neurodegenerative disorders.
- 2020
-
Ingår i: Nature Reviews Neurology. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 1759-4766 .- 1759-4758. ; 16, s. 265-284
-
Forskningsöversikt (refereegranskat)abstract
- Cerebrospinal fluid analyses and neuroimaging can identify the underlying pathophysiology at the earliest stage of some neurodegenerative disorders, but do not have the scalability needed for population screening. Therefore, a blood-based marker for such pathophysiology would have greater utility in a primary care setting and in eligibility screening for clinical trials. Rapid advances in ultra-sensitive assays have enabled the levels of pathological proteins to be measured in blood samples, but research has been predominantly focused on Alzheimer disease (AD). Nonetheless, proteins that were identified as potential blood-based biomarkers for AD, for example, amyloid-β, tau, phosphorylated tau and neurofilament light chain, are likely to be relevant to other neurodegenerative disorders that involve similar pathological processes and could also be useful for the differential diagnosis of clinical symptoms. This Review outlines the neuropathological, clinical, molecular imaging and cerebrospinal fluid features of the most common neurodegenerative disorders outside the AD continuum and gives an overview of the current status of blood-based biomarkers for these disorders.
|
|
| 3. |
- Barthélemy, Nicolas R, et al.
(författare)
-
Highly Accurate Blood Test for Alzheimer's Disease Comparable or Superior to Clinical CSF Tests
-
Ingår i: Nature Medicine. - 1546-170X.
-
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.
|
|
| 4. |
- Bocancea, Diana I., et al.
(författare)
-
Determinants of cognitive and brain resilience to tau pathology: a longitudinal analysis
- 2023
-
Ingår i: Brain. - : Oxford University Press (OUP). - 0006-8950 .- 1460-2156. ; 146:9, s. 3719-3734
-
Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Mechanisms of resilience against tau pathology in individuals across the Alzheimer’s disease spectrum are insufficiently understood. Longitudinal data are necessary to reveal which factors relate to preserved cognition (i.e. cognitive resilience) and brain structure (i.e. brain resilience) despite abundant tau pathology, and to clarify whether these associations are cross-sectional or longitudinal. We employed a longitudinal study design to investigate the role of several demographic, biological and brain structural factors in yielding cognitive and brain resilience to tau pathology as measured with PET.In this multicenter study, we included 366 amyloid-β-positive individuals with mild cognitive impairment or Alzheimer’s disease-dementia with baseline [18F]flortaucipir-PET and longitudinal cognitive assessments. A subset (n = 200) additionally underwent longitudinal structural MRI. We used linear mixed-effects models with global cognition and cortical thickness as dependent variables to investigate determinants of cognitive resilience and brain resilience, respectively. Models assessed whether age, sex, years of education, APOE-ε4 status, intracranial volume (and cortical thickness for cognitive resilience models) modified the association of tau pathology with cognitive decline or cortical thinning.We found that the association between higher baseline tau-PET levels (quantified in a temporal meta-region of interest) and rate of cognitive decline (measured with repeated Mini-Mental State Examination) was adversely modified by older age (Stβinteraction = -0.062, P = 0.032), higher education level (Stβinteraction = -0.072, P = 0.011) and higher intracranial volume (Stβinteraction = -0.07, P = 0.016). Younger age, higher education and greater cortical thickness were associated with better cognitive performance at baseline. Greater cortical thickness was furthermore associated with slower cognitive decline independent of tau burden. Higher education also modified the negative impact of tau-PET on cortical thinning, while older age was associated with higher baseline cortical thickness and slower rate of cortical thinning independent of tau. Our analyses revealed no (cross-sectional or longitudinal) associations for sex and APOE-ε4 status on cognition and cortical thickness.In this longitudinal study of clinically impaired individuals with underlying Alzheimer’s disease neuropathological changes, we identified education as the most robust determinant of both cognitive and brain resilience against tau pathology. The observed interaction with tau burden on cognitive decline suggests that education may be protective against cognitive decline and brain atrophy at lower levels of tau pathology, with a potential depletion of resilience resources with advancing pathology. Finally, we did not find major contributions of sex to brain nor cognitive resilience, suggesting that previous links between sex and resilience might be mainly driven by cross-sectional differences.
|
|
| 5. |
- Groot, Colin, et al.
(författare)
-
Latent atrophy factors related to phenotypical variants of posterior cortical atrophy
- 2020
-
Ingår i: Neurology. - 1526-632X. ; 95:12, s. 1672-1685
-
Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- OBJECTIVE: To determine whether atrophy relates to phenotypical variants of posterior cortical atrophy (PCA) recently proposed in clinical criteria (i.e., dorsal, ventral, dominant-parietal, and caudal) we assessed associations between latent atrophy factors and cognition. METHODS: We employed a data-driven Bayesian modeling framework based on latent Dirichlet allocation to identify latent atrophy factors in a multicenter cohort of 119 individuals with PCA (age 64 ± 7 years, 38% male, Mini-Mental State Examination 21 ± 5, 71% β-amyloid positive, 29% β-amyloid status unknown). The model uses standardized gray matter density images as input (adjusted for age, sex, intracranial volume, MRI scanner field strength, and whole-brain gray matter volume) and provides voxelwise probabilistic maps for a predetermined number of atrophy factors, allowing every individual to express each factor to a degree without a priori classification. Individual factor expressions were correlated to 4 PCA-specific cognitive domains (object perception, space perception, nonvisual/parietal functions, and primary visual processing) using general linear models. RESULTS: The model revealed 4 distinct yet partially overlapping atrophy factors: right-dorsal, right-ventral, left-ventral, and limbic. We found that object perception and primary visual processing were associated with atrophy that predominantly reflects the right-ventral factor. Furthermore, space perception was associated with atrophy that predominantly represents the right-dorsal and right-ventral factors. However, individual participant profiles revealed that the large majority expressed multiple atrophy factors and had mixed clinical profiles with impairments across multiple domains, rather than displaying a discrete clinical-radiologic phenotype. CONCLUSION: Our results indicate that specific brain behavior networks are vulnerable in PCA, but most individuals display a constellation of affected brain regions and symptoms, indicating that classification into 4 mutually exclusive variants is unlikely to be clinically useful.
|
|
| 6. |
- Illán-Gala, Ignacio, et al.
(författare)
-
Plasma tau and neurofilament light in frontotemporal lobar degeneration and Alzheimer's disease.
- 2021
-
Ingår i: Neurology. - 1526-632X. ; 96:5
-
Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- To test the hypothesis that plasma total tau (t-tau) and neurofilament light chain (NfL) concentrations may have a differential role in the study of frontotemporal lobar degeneration syndromes (FTLD-S) and clinically-diagnosed Alzheimer's disease (AD-S), we determined their diagnostic and prognostic value in FTLD-S and AD-S and their sensitivity to pathologic diagnoses.We measured plasma t-tau and NfL with the Simoa platform in 265 participants: 167 FTLD-S, 43 AD-S, and 55 healthy controls (HC), including 82 pathology-proven cases (50 FTLD-Tau, 18 FTLD-TDP, 2 FTLD-FUS, and 12 AD) and 98 participants with amyloid PET. We compared cross-sectional and longitudinal biomarker concentrations between groups, their correlation with clinical measures of disease severity, progression and survival and cortical thickness.Plasma NfL, but not plasma t-tau discriminated FTLD-S from HC and AD-S from HC. Both plasma NfL and t-tau were poor discriminators between FLTD-S and AD-S. In pathology confirmed cases, plasma NfL was higher in FTLD than AD and in FTLD-TDP compared to FTLD-Tau, after accounting for age and disease severity. Plasma NfL, but not plasma t-tau, predicted clinical decline and survival and correlated with regional cortical thickness in both FTLD-S and AD-S. The combination of plasma NfL with plasma t-tau did not outperform plasma NfL alone.Plasma NfL is superior to plasma t-tau for the diagnosis and prediction of clinical progression of FTLD-S and AD-S.This study provides Class III evidence that plasma NfL has superior diagnostic and prognostic performance than plasma t-tau in FTLD and AD.
|
|
| 7. |
- Leuzy, Antoine, et al.
(författare)
-
A multicenter comparison of [18F]flortaucipir, [18F]RO948, and [18F]MK6240 tau PET tracers to detect a common target ROI for differential diagnosis
- 2021
-
Ingår i: European Journal of Nuclear Medicine and Molecular Imaging. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 1619-7070 .- 1619-7089. ; 48:7, s. 2295-2305
-
Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Purpose: This study aims to determine whether comparable target regions of interest (ROIs) and cut-offs can be used across [18F]flortaucipir, [18F]RO948, and [18F]MK6240 tau positron emission tomography (PET) tracers for differential diagnosis of Alzheimer’s disease (AD) dementia vs either cognitively unimpaired (CU) individuals or non-AD neurodegenerative diseases. Methods: A total of 1755 participants underwent tau PET using either [18F]flortaucipir (n = 975), [18F]RO948 (n = 493), or [18F]MK6240 (n = 287). SUVR values were calculated across four theory-driven ROIs and several tracer-specific data-driven (hierarchical clustering) regions of interest (ROIs). Diagnostic performance and cut-offs for ROIs were determined using receiver operating characteristic analyses and the Youden index, respectively. Results: Comparable diagnostic performance (area under the receiver operating characteristic curve [AUC]) was observed between theory- and data-driven ROIs. The theory-defined temporal meta-ROI generally performed very well for all three tracers (AUCs: 0.926–0.996). An SUVR value of approximately 1.35 was a common threshold when using this ROI. Conclusion: The temporal meta-ROI can be used for differential diagnosis of dementia patients with [18F]flortaucipir, [18F]RO948, and [18F]MK6240 tau PET with high accuracy, and that using very similar cut-offs of around 1.35 SUVR. This ROI/SUVR cut-off can also be applied across tracers to define tau positivity.
|
|
| 8. |
- Leuzy, Antoine, et al.
(författare)
-
Robustness of CSF Aβ42/40 and Aβ42/P-tau181 measured using fully automated immunoassays to detect AD-related outcomes
- 2023
-
Ingår i: Alzheimer's and Dementia. - : Wiley. - 1552-5260 .- 1552-5279. ; 19:7, s. 2994-3004
-
Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Introduction: This study investigated the comparability of cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) cutoffs for Elecsys immunoassays for amyloid beta (Aβ)42/Aβ40 or Aβ42/phosphorylated tau (p-tau)181 and the effects of measurement variability when predicting Alzheimer's disease (AD)-related outcomes (i.e., Aβ-positron emission tomography [PET] visual read and AD neuropathology). Methods: We studied 750 participants (BioFINDER study, Alzheimer's Disease Neuroimaging Initiative [ADNI], and University of California San Francisco [UCSF]). Youden's index was used to identify cutoffs and to calculate accuracy (Aβ-PET visual read as outcome). Using longitudinal variability in Aβ-negative controls, we identified a gray zone around cut-points where the risk of an inconsistent predicted outcome was >5%. Results: For Aβ42/Aβ40, cutoffs across cohorts were <0.059 (BioFINDER), <0.057 (ADNI), and <0.058 (UCSF). For Aβ42/p-tau181, cutoffs were <41.90 (BioFINDER), <39.20 (ADNI), and <46.02 (UCSF). Accuracy was ≈90% for both Aβ42/Aβ40 and Aβ42/p-tau181 using these cutoffs. Using Aβ-PET as an outcome, 8.7% of participants fell within a gray zone interval for Aβ42/Aβ40, compared to 4.5% for Aβ42/p-tau181. Similar findings were observed using a measure of overall AD neuropathologic change (7.7% vs. 3.3%). In a subset with CSF and plasma Aβ42/40, the number of individuals within the gray zone was ≈1.5 to 3 times greater when using plasma Aβ42/40. Discussion: CSF Aβ42/p-tau181 was more robust to the effects of measurement variability, suggesting that it may be the preferred Elecsys-based measure in clinical practice and trials.
|
|
| 9. |
- Maass, Anne, et al.
(författare)
-
Alzheimer's pathology targets distinct memory networks in the ageing brain
- 2019
-
Ingår i: Brain : a journal of neurology. - : Oxford University Press (OUP). - 1460-2156. ; 142:8, s. 2492-2509
-
Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Alzheimer's disease researchers have been intrigued by the selective regional vulnerability of the brain to amyloid-β plaques and tau neurofibrillary tangles. Post-mortem studies indicate that in ageing and Alzheimer's disease tau tangles deposit early in the transentorhinal cortex, a region located in the anterior-temporal lobe that is critical for object memory. In contrast, amyloid-β pathology seems to target a posterior-medial network that subserves spatial memory. In the current study, we tested whether anterior-temporal and posterior-medial brain regions are selectively vulnerable to tau and amyloid-β deposition in the progression from ageing to Alzheimer's disease and whether this is reflected in domain-specific behavioural deficits and neural dysfunction. 11C-PiB PET and 18F-flortaucipir uptake was quantified in a sample of 131 cognitively normal adults (age: 20-93 years; 47 amyloid-β-positive) and 20 amyloid-β-positive patients with mild cognitive impairment or Alzheimer's disease dementia (65-95 years). Tau burden was relatively higher in anterior-temporal regions in normal ageing and this difference was further pronounced in the presence of amyloid-β and cognitive impairment, indicating exacerbation of ageing-related processes in Alzheimer's disease. In contrast, amyloid-β deposition dominated in posterior-medial regions. A subsample of 50 cognitively normal older (26 amyloid-β-positive) and 25 young adults performed an object and scene memory task while functional MRI data were acquired. Group comparisons showed that tau-positive (n = 18) compared to tau-negative (n = 32) older adults showed lower mnemonic discrimination of object relative to scene images [t(48) = -3.2, P = 0.002]. In a multiple regression model including regional measures of both pathologies, higher anterior-temporal flortaucipir (tau) was related to relatively worse object performance (P = 0.010, r = -0.376), whereas higher posterior-medial PiB (amyloid-β) was related to worse scene performance (P = 0.037, r = 0.309). The functional MRI data revealed that tau burden (but not amyloid-β) was associated with increased task activation in both systems and a loss of functional specificity, or dedifferentiation, in posterior-medial regions. The loss of functional specificity was related to worse memory. Our study shows a regional dissociation of Alzheimer's disease pathologies to distinct memory networks. While our data are cross-sectional, they indicate that with ageing, tau deposits mainly in the anterior-temporal system, which results in deficits in mnemonic object discrimination. As Alzheimer's disease develops, amyloid-β deposits preferentially in posterior-medial regions additionally compromising scene discrimination and anterior-temporal tau deposition worsens further. Finally, our findings propose that the progression of tau pathology is linked to aberrant activation and dedifferentiation of specialized memory networks that is detrimental to memory function.
|
|
| 10. |
- Mattsson-Carlgren, Niklas, et al.
(författare)
-
Cerebrospinal fluid biomarkers in autopsy-confirmed Alzheimer disease and frontotemporal lobar degeneration
- 2022
-
Ingår i: Neurology. - 0028-3878. ; 98:11, s. 1137-1150
-
Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Background and Objectives To determine how fully automated Elecsys CSF immunoassays for β-amyloid (Aβ) and tau biomarkers and an ultrasensitive Simoa assay for neurofilament light chain (NFL) correlate with neuropathologic changes of Alzheimer disease (AD) and frontotemporal lobar degeneration (FTLD). Methods We studied 101 patients with antemortem CSF and neuropathology data. CSF samples were collected a mean of 2.9 years before death (range 0.2–7.5 years). CSF was analyzed for Aβ40, Aβ42, total tau (T-tau), tau phosphorylated at amino acid residue 181 (P-tau), P-tau/Aβ42 and Aβ42/Aβ40 ratios, and NFL. Neuropathology measures included Thal phases, Braak stages, Consortium to Establish a Registry for Alzheimer’s Disease (CERAD) scores, AD neuropathologic change (ADNC), and primary and contributory pathologic diagnoses. Associations between CSF biomarkers and neuropathologic features were tested in regression models adjusted for age, sex, and time from sampling to death. Results CSF biomarkers were associated with neuropathologic measures of Aβ (Thal, CERAD score), tau (Braak stage), and overall ADNC. The CSF P-tau/Aβ42 and Aβ42/Aβ40 ratios had high sensitivity, specificity, and overall diagnostic performance for intermediate-high ADNC (area under the curve range 0.95–0.96). Distinct biomarker patterns were seen in different FTLD subtypes, with increased NFL and reduced P-tau/T-tau in FTLD–TAR DNA-binding protein 43 and reduced T-tau in progressive supranuclear palsy compared to other FTLD variants. Discussion CSF biomarkers, including P-tau, T-tau, Aβ42, Aβ40, and NFL, support in vivo identification of AD neuropathology and correlate with FTLD neuropathology.
|
|
