scholarly journals Noninvasive characterization of Alzheimer’s disease by circulating, cell-free messenger RNA next-generation sequencing

2020 ◽  
Vol 6 (50) ◽  
pp. eabb1654
Author(s):  
Shusuke Toden ◽  
Jiali Zhuang ◽  
Alexander D. Acosta ◽  
Amy P. Karns ◽  
Neeraj S. Salathia ◽  
...  

The lack of accessible noninvasive tools to examine the molecular alterations occurring in the brain limits our understanding of the causes and progression of Alzheimer’s disease (AD), as well as the identification of effective therapeutic strategies. Here, we conducted a comprehensive profiling of circulating, cell-free messenger RNA (cf-mRNA) in plasma of 126 patients with AD and 116 healthy controls of similar age. We identified 2591 dysregulated genes in the cf-mRNA of patients with AD, which are enriched in biological processes well known to be associated with AD. Dysregulated genes included brain-specific genes and resembled those identified to be dysregulated in postmortem AD brain tissue. Furthermore, we identified disease-relevant circulating gene transcripts that correlated with the severity of cognitive impairment. These data highlight the potential of high-throughput cf-mRNA sequencing to evaluate AD-related pathophysiological alterations in the brain, leading to precision healthcare solutions that could improve AD patient management.

Life ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (5) ◽  
pp. 64
Author(s):  
Linlin Wang ◽  
Li Zeng ◽  
Hailun Jiang ◽  
Zhuorong Li ◽  
Rui Liu

Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is a progressive neurodegenerative disease characterized by a deficiency in cognitive skills. Although long noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs) have been proposed as associated with AD, the aberrant lncRNAs expression and the co-expression of lncRNAs-mRNAs network in AD remains unclear. Therefore, in this study, lncRNA microarray was performed on the brain of APP/PS1 mice at different age, widely used as an AD mouse model, and on age-matched wide-type controls. Our results identified a total of 3306 lncRNAs and 2458 mRNAs as aberrantly expressed among AD mice at different age and their age-matched control. Gene Ontology and pathway analysis of the AD-related lncRNAs and mRNAs indicated that neuroinflammation-related and synaptic transmission signaling pathways represented the main enriched pathways. An lncRNA–mRNA–miRNA network between the differentially expressed transcripts was constructed. Moreover, an mRNA–miRNA network between both significantly dysregulated and highly conserved genes was also constructed, and among this network, the IGF1, P2RX7, TSPO, SERPINE1, EGFR, HMOX1, and NFE212 genes were predicted to play a role in the development of AD. In conclusion, this study illustrated the prognostic value of lncRNAs and mRNAs associated to AD pathology by microarray analysis and might provide potential novel biomarkers in the diagnosis and treatment of AD.


Entropy ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 21 (6) ◽  
pp. 544 ◽  
Author(s):  
Aarón Maturana-Candelas ◽  
Carlos Gómez ◽  
Jesús Poza ◽  
Nadia Pinto ◽  
Roberto Hornero

Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is a neurodegenerative disorder with high prevalence, known for its highly disabling symptoms. The aim of this study was to characterize the alterations in the irregularity and the complexity of the brain activity along the AD continuum. Both irregularity and complexity can be studied applying entropy-based measures throughout multiple temporal scales. In this regard, multiscale sample entropy (MSE) and refined multiscale spectral entropy (rMSSE) were calculated from electroencephalographic (EEG) data. Five minutes of resting-state EEG activity were recorded from 51 healthy controls, 51 mild cognitive impaired (MCI) subjects, 51 mild AD patients (ADMIL), 50 moderate AD patients (ADMOD), and 50 severe AD patients (ADSEV). Our results show statistically significant differences (p-values < 0.05, FDR-corrected Kruskal–Wallis test) between the five groups at each temporal scale. Additionally, average slope values and areas under MSE and rMSSE curves revealed significant changes in complexity mainly for controls vs. MCI, MCI vs. ADMIL and ADMOD vs. ADSEV comparisons (p-values < 0.05, FDR-corrected Mann–Whitney U-test). These findings indicate that MSE and rMSSE reflect the neuronal disturbances associated with the development of dementia, and may contribute to the development of new tools to track the AD progression.


2014 ◽  
Vol 2 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ivan Carrera ◽  
Ignacio Etcheverria ◽  
Yi Li ◽  
Lucia Fernandez-Novoa ◽  
Valter Lombardi ◽  
...  

Introduction: APP/PS1 double-transgenic mouse models of Alzheimer’s disease (AD), which overexpress mutated forms of the gene for the human amyloid precursor protein (APP) and presenilin 1 (PS1), have provided robust neuropathological hallmarks of an AD-like pattern at early ages. This study aimed to characterize immunocytochemical patterns of the AD mouse brain, which is treated with the EB101 vaccine, as a model for human AD.Material and methods: In this novel vaccine, a new approach has been taken to circumvent past failures with Aβ vaccines by judiciously selecting an adjuvant consisting of a physiological matrix embedded in liposomes, composed of naturally occurring phospholipids (phosphatidylcholine, phosphatidylglycerol, and cholesterol).Results: Our findings showed that the administration of amyloid-β1−42 (Aβ) and sphingosine-1-phosphate emulsified in liposome complex (EB101) to APP/PS1 mice before the onset of Aβ brain deposition (at 7 weeks of age) and/or at an older age (35 weeks of age) can be effective in both halting the progression and clearing the AD-like neuropathological hallmarks. In addition, passive immunization with EB101 did not activate inflammatory responses from the immune system and astrocytes. Consistent with a decreased inflammatory background, the basal immunological interaction between the T cells and the affected areas (hippocampus) in the brain of treated mice was notably reduced.Conclusion: These results provide strong evidence that immunization with the EB101 vaccine prevents and attenuates AD neuropathology in this type of double-transgenic mice.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mitsuru Shinohara ◽  
Junko Hirokawa ◽  
Akemi Shimodaira ◽  
Yoshitaka Tashiro ◽  
Kaoru Suzuki ◽  
...  

Abstract Background: One main pathological hallmark of Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is tau accumulation as neurofibrillary tangles (NFTs) in the brain. Although sandwich enzyme-linked immunosorbent assays (ELISAs) are useful for quantifying tau levels, including those in CSF, plasma and brain, it has not yet been determined which antibody combination is the most appropriate for assessing the neuropathological accumulation of tau in the brain. Methods: We developed several sandwich tau ELISAs by introducing antibodies against several tau epitopes, including from its N-terminal and C-terminal regions, and evaluated tau levels depending on disease stage, brain areas, and other AD-related changes. Results: We observed that tau levels in insoluble brain fraction determined by each ELISAs differ depending on the epitopes of the antibodies: there is a trend that non-AD control samples yield relatively high signals when an antibody against the N-terminal region of tau is used. On the other hand, ELISAs combining two antibodies against the later-middle to C-terminal regions of tau produced substantially increased signals from AD samples, compared to those from non-AD controls. Such ELISAs better distinguish AD and non-AD controls, and the results are more closely associated with Braak NFT stage, Aβ accumulation, and neuroinflammatory markers. In addition, these ELISAs can reflect the pattern of tau spread across brain regions. Conclusions: Tau ELISAs that combine two antibodies against the later-middle to C-terminal regions of tau can better reflect neuropathological tau accumulation, which would enable to evaluate tau accumulation in the brain at a biochemical level.


2016 ◽  
Vol 12 ◽  
pp. P465-P465
Author(s):  
Lewis I. Joo ◽  
Aaron Y. Lai ◽  
John G. Sled ◽  
JoAnne McLaurin ◽  
Bojana Stefanovic

GeroPsych ◽  
2012 ◽  
Vol 25 (4) ◽  
pp. 235-245 ◽  
Author(s):  
Katja Franke ◽  
Christian Gaser

We recently proposed a novel method that aggregates the multidimensional aging pattern across the brain to a single value. This method proved to provide stable and reliable estimates of brain aging – even across different scanners. While investigating longitudinal changes in BrainAGE in about 400 elderly subjects, we discovered that patients with Alzheimer’s disease and subjects who had converted to AD within 3 years showed accelerated brain atrophy by +6 years at baseline. An additional increase in BrainAGE accumulated to a score of about +9 years during follow-up. Accelerated brain aging was related to prospective cognitive decline and disease severity. In conclusion, the BrainAGE framework indicates discrepancies in brain aging and could thus serve as an indicator for cognitive functioning in the future.


PIERS Online ◽  
2009 ◽  
Vol 5 (4) ◽  
pp. 311-315 ◽  
Author(s):  
Natalia V. Bobkova ◽  
Vadim V. Novikov ◽  
Natalia I. Medvinskaya ◽  
Irina Yu. Aleksandrova ◽  
Eugenii E. Fesenko

Author(s):  
Burbaeva G.Sh. ◽  
Androsova L.V. ◽  
Vorobyeva E.A. ◽  
Savushkina O.K.

The aim of the study was to evaluate the rate of polymerization of tubulin into microtubules and determine the level of colchicine binding (colchicine-binding activity of tubulin) in the prefrontal cortex in schizophrenia, vascular dementia (VD) and control. Colchicine-binding activity of tubulin was determined by Sherlinе in tubulin-enriched extracts of proteins from the samples. Measurement of light scattering during the polymerization of the tubulin was carried out using the nephelometric method at a wavelength of 450-550 nm. There was a significant decrease in colchicine-binding activity and the rate of tubulin polymerization in the prefrontal cortex in both diseases, and in VD to a greater extent than in schizophrenia. The obtained results suggest that not only in Alzheimer's disease, but also in other mental diseases such as schizophrenia and VD, there is a decrease in the level of tubulin in the prefrontal cortex of the brain, although to a lesser extent than in Alzheimer's disease, and consequently the amount of microtubules.


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