Nutritional status and structural brain changes in Alzheimer's disease: The NUDAD project

INTRODUCTION: Weight loss is associated with higher mortality and progression of cognitive decline, but its associations with magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) changes related to Alzheimer's disease (AD) are unknown. METHODS: We included 412 patients from the NUDAD project, comprising 129 with AD dementia, 107 with mild cognitive impairment (MCI), and 176 controls. Associations between nutritional status and MRI measures were analyzed using linear regression, adjusted for age, sex, education, cognitive functioning, and cardiovascular risk factors. RESULTS: Lower body mass index (BMI), fat mass (FM), and fat free mass index were associated with higher medial temporal atrophy (MTA) scores. Lower BMI, FM, and waist circumference were associated with more microbleeds. Stratification by diagnosis showed that the observed associations with microbleeds were only significant in MCI. DISCUSSION: Lower indicators of nutritional status were associated with more MTA and microbleeds, with largest effect sizes in MCI

Biomarker Report from the Phase II Lamotrigine Trial in Secondary Progressive MS - Neurofilament as a Surrogate of Disease Progression

This work was supported by National MS Society (USA) under the Promise 2010 initiative and the MS Society of Great Britain and Northern Ireland as part of exploratory analysis for the UK MS Clinical Trial Network. VL is supported by Italian Minister of Health grant for young researcher 2008

High Degree of Heterogeneity in Alzheimer's Disease Progression Patterns

There have been several reports on the varying rates of progression among Alzheimer's Disease (AD) patients; however, there has been no quantitative study of the amount of heterogeneity in AD. Obtaining a reliable quantitative measure of AD progression rates and their variances among the patients for each stage of AD is essential for evaluating results of any clinical study. The Global Deterioration Scale (GDS) and Functional Assessment Staging procedure (FAST) characterize seven stages in the course of AD from normal aging to severe dementia. Each GDS/FAST stage has a published mean duration, but the variance is unknown. We use statistical analysis to reconstruct GDS/FAST stage durations in a cohort of 648 AD patients with an average follow-up time of 4.78 years. Calculations for GDS/FAST stages 4–6 reveal that the standard deviations for stage durations are comparable with their mean values, indicating the presence of large variations in the AD progression among patients. Such amount of heterogeneity in the course of progression of AD is consistent with the existence of several sub-groups of AD patients, which differ by their patterns of decline

Evidence of a cubic iron sub-lattice in t-CuFe2O4 demonstrated by X-ray Absorption Fine Structure

Copper ferrite, belonging to the wide and technologically relevant class of spinel ferrites, was grown in the form of t-CuFe2O4 nanocrystals within a porous matrix of silica in the form of either an aerogel or a xerogel, and com-pared to a bulk sample. Extended X-ray absorption fine structure (EXAFS) spectroscopy revealed the presence of two different sub-lattices within the crystal structure of t-CuFe2O4, one tetragonal and one cubic, defined by the Cu2+ and Fe3+ ions respectively. Our investigation provides evidence that the Jahn-Teller distortion, which occurs on the Cu2+ ions located in octahedral sites, does not affect the coordination geometry of the Fe3+ ions, regardless of their location in octahedral or tetrahedral sites

Body Fluid Cytokine Levels in Mild Cognitive Impairment and Alzheimer’s Disease: a Comparative Overview

This article gives a comprehensive overview of cytokine and other inflammation associated protein levels in plasma, serum and cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) of patients with Alzheimer's disease (AD) and mild cognitive impairment (MCI). We reviewed 118 research articles published between 1989 and 2013 to compare the reported levels of 66 cytokines and other proteins related to regulation and signaling in inflammation in the blood or CSF obtained from MCI and AD patients. Several cytokines are evidently regulated in (neuro-) inflammatory processes associated with neurodegenerative disorders. Others do not display changes in the blood or CSF during disease progression. However, many reports on cytokine levels in MCI or AD are controversial or inconclusive, particularly those which provide data on frequently investigated cytokines like tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNF-α) or interleukin-6 (IL-6). The levels of several cytokines are possible indicators of neuroinflammation in AD. Some of them might increase steadily during disease progression or temporarily at the time of MCI to AD conversion. Furthermore, elevated body fluid cytokine levels may correlate with an increased risk of conversion from MCI to AD. Yet, research results are conflicting. To overcome interindividual variances and to obtain a more definite description of cytokine regulation and function in neurodegeneration, a high degree of methodical standardization and patients collective characterization, together with longitudinal sampling over years is essential