Department of Neuroscience, University of Sheffield, Beech Hill Road, Sheffield, S10 2RX, UK.
Sci Rep. 2020 Oct 30;10(1):18707. doi: 10.1038/s41598-020-71368-1.
Evidence from murine models and human post-mortem studies indicates that monoaminergic nuclei undergo degeneration at the pre-symptomatic stage of Alzheimer's disease (AD). Analysing 129 datasets from the Alzheimer's Disease Neuroimaging Initiative (ADNI) and relying on the Clinical Dementia Rating as group-defining instrument, we hypothesised that the MRI signal of monoaminergic nuclei would be a statistically significant predictor of memory decline in participants initially recruited in ADNI as healthy adults. As opposed to a group of cognitively stable participants, participants developing memory decline had reduced signal in the ventral tegmental area at baseline, before any evidence of functional decline emerged. These findings indicate that monoaminergic degeneration predates the onset of memory decline in an AD-centred initiative, with a crucial involvement of very-early changes of a dopaminergic region. This translates into potential informative avenues for pharmacological treatment of pre-symptomatic AD.
来自于鼠类模型和人类尸检研究的证据表明，单胺能核在阿尔茨海默病（AD）的症状前阶段就会发生退行性变。本研究分析了来自阿尔茨海默病神经影像学倡议（ADNI）的 129 个数据集，并依赖于临床痴呆评定量表作为分组定义工具，我们假设单胺能核的 MRI 信号将是 ADNI 中最初招募为健康成年人的参与者记忆下降的一个统计学上显著的预测因子。与认知稳定的参与者组相比，在出现任何功能下降的证据之前，记忆下降的参与者在基线时腹侧被盖区的信号就已经减少了。这些发现表明，单胺能退行性变发生在以 AD 为中心的研究中记忆下降之前，多巴胺能区域的非常早期变化起着关键作用。这为治疗 AD 的药物治疗提供了潜在的信息途径。
