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Nutritional Neuroscience Jul 2024Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a progressive neurodegenerative disorder affecting approximately 55 million individuals globally. Diagnosis typically occurs in advanced... (Review)
Review
OBJECTIVES
Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a progressive neurodegenerative disorder affecting approximately 55 million individuals globally. Diagnosis typically occurs in advanced stages, and there are limited options for reversing symptoms. Preventive strategies are, therefore, crucial. Time Restricted Eating (TRE) or Time Restricted Feeding (TRF) is one such strategy. Here we review recent research on AD and TRE/TRF in addition to AD biomarkers and gut microbiota.
METHODS
A comprehensive review of recent studies was conducted to assess the impact of TRE/TRF on AD-related outcomes. This includes the analysis of how TRE/TRF influences circadian rhythms, beta-amyloid 42 (Aß42), pro-inflammatory cytokines levels, and gut microbiota composition.
RESULTS
TRE/TRF impacts circadian rhythms and can influence cognitive performance as observed in AD. It lowers beta-amyloid 42 deposition in the brain, a key AD biomarker, and reduces pro-ininflammatory cytokines. The gut microbiome has emerged as a modifiable factor in AD treatment. TRE/TRF changes the structure and composition of the gut microbiota, leading to increased diversity and a decrease in harmful bacteria.
DISCUSSION
These findings underscore the potential of TRE/TRF as a preventive strategy for AD. By reducing Aß42 plaques, modulating pro-inflammatory cytokines, and altering gut microbiota composition, TRE/TRF may slow the progression of AD. Further research is needed to confirm these effects and to understand the mechanisms involved. This review highlights TRE/TRF as a promising non-pharmacological intervention in the fight against AD.
PubMed: 38953237
DOI: 10.1080/1028415X.2024.2359868 -
ESC Heart Failure Jul 2024
PubMed: 38953155
DOI: 10.1002/ehf2.14941 -
Cureus May 2024Background The elderly population continues to grow worldwide, including in Saudi Arabia. Caring for older people with Alzheimer's and dementia disease is very...
Background The elderly population continues to grow worldwide, including in Saudi Arabia. Caring for older people with Alzheimer's and dementia disease is very challenging and merits specific skills, knowledge, and attitudes among nurses and nursing students. Consequently, nursing students must be prepared with the appropriate knowledge and attitude to care for patients affected by Alzheimer's in their future professions. This study aimed to investigate the knowledge and attitudes of Alzheimer's disease (AD) among bachelor's nursing students in Saudi Arabia. Methods This study used a descriptive cross-sectional design, and data were collected via an online questionnaire comprising two main instruments: the Alzheimer's Disease Knowledge Scale (ADKS) and the Dementia Attitudes Scale (DAS). A total of 477 undergraduate nursing students participated in the study at four universities in four regions of Saudi Arabia. Result The results indicated that Saudi nursing students exhibited insufficient knowledge regarding individuals with AD, reflected by a mean ADKS score of 13.83 out of 30. Yet, they displayed positive attitudes, as indicated by a mean DAS score of 99.29 out of 140. Nursing students in their third year and those who had family members with AD had a higher significant score regarding their knowledge of AD than nursing students who were in their fourth year or those who did not have family members who had AD. Additionally, nursing students aged 20 to 25 years, as well as nursing students in their fourth year, had more positive attitudes toward working with AD patients. Conclusions In conclusion, this study revealed that although many nursing students have a positive attitude toward working with AD patients, they have insufficient knowledge of AD. Therefore, there is an urgent necessity for enhanced educational initiatives, encompassing both greater depth and improved quality, as well as increased clinical training to address this knowledge gap among nursing students in Saudi Arabia.
PubMed: 38953079
DOI: 10.7759/cureus.61444 -
Frontiers in Plant Science 2024is a traditional Chinese herb that has gained much attention for its production of Huperzine A (HupA). HupA has shown promise on treating Alzheimer's disease (AD)....
INTRODUCTION
is a traditional Chinese herb that has gained much attention for its production of Huperzine A (HupA). HupA has shown promise on treating Alzheimer's disease (AD). However, the biosynthetic pathway and molecular mechanism of HupA in are still not well understood.
METHODS
Integrated transcriptome and metabolome analysis was performed to reveal the molecular mechanisms related to HupA biosynthesis and antioxidant activity in .
RESULTS
HT ( thallus) exhibits higher antioxidant activity and lower cytotoxicity than WH (wild ). Through hierarchical clustering analysis and qRT-PCR verification, 7 important enzyme genes and 13 transcription factors (TFs) related to HupA biosynthesis were detected. Among them, the average |logFC| value of (Cytochrome P450) and (Copper amine oxidase) was the largest. Metabolomic analysis identified 12 metabolites involved in the HupA biosynthesis and 29 metabolites related to antioxidant activity. KEGG co-enrichment analysis revealed that tropane, piperidine and pyridine alkaloid biosynthesis were involved in the HupA biosynthesis pathway. Furthermore, the phenylpropanoid, phenylalanine, and flavonoid biosynthesis pathway were found to regulate the antioxidant activity of . The study also identified seven important genes related to the regulation of antioxidant activity, including (primary-amine oxidase). Based on the above joint analysis, the biosynthetic pathway of HupA and potential mechanisms of antioxidant in was constructed.
DISCUSSION
Through differential transcriptome and metabolome analysis, DEGs and DAMs involved in HupA biosynthesis and antioxidant-related were identified, and the potential metabolic pathway related to HupA biosynthesis and antioxidant in were constructed. This study would provide valuable insights into the HupA biosynthesis mechanism and the thallus medicinal value.
PubMed: 38952843
DOI: 10.3389/fpls.2024.1411471 -
Network Neuroscience (Cambridge, Mass.) 2024[This corrects the article DOI: 10.1162/netn_a_00224.].
[This corrects the article DOI: 10.1162/netn_a_00224.].
PubMed: 38952811
DOI: 10.1162/netn_x_00380 -
Clinical Epidemiology 2024Frozen shoulder may be an early preclinical symptom of Parkinson's disease (PD).
BACKGROUND
Frozen shoulder may be an early preclinical symptom of Parkinson's disease (PD).
OBJECTIVE
To examine PD risk after frozen shoulder diagnosis and to evaluate this disorder as a possible manifestation of parkinsonism preceding the clinical recognition of PD and possible target for screening.
METHODS
Danish population-based medical registries were used to identify patients aged ≥40 years with a first-time frozen shoulder diagnosis (1995-2016). A comparison cohort was randomly selected from the general population matched on age and sex. To address detection bias and the specificity of frozen shoulder diagnosis, we performed a sensitivity analysis, using similar matching criteria to select a cohort of patients with back pain diagnosis. The outcome was incident PD. Cumulative incidences and adjusted hazard ratios (HRs) were estimated with 95% confidence intervals (CIs).
RESULTS
We identified 37,041 individuals with frozen shoulder, 370,410 general population comparators, and 111,101 back pain comparators. The cumulative incidence of PD at 0-22 years follow-up was 1.51% in the frozen shoulder cohort, 1.03% in the general population cohort, and 1.32% in the back pain cohort. For frozen shoulder versus general population, adjusted HRs were 1.94 (CI: 1.20-3.13) at 0-1 years and 1.45 (CI: 1.24-1.70) at 0-22 years follow-up. For frozen shoulder versus back pain, adjusted HRs were 0.89 (CI: 0.54-1.46) and 1.01 (CI: 0.84-1.21), respectively.
CONCLUSION
Patients with frozen shoulder had an increased PD risk compared with the general population, although the absolute risks were low. Frozen shoulder might sometimes represent early manifestations of PD. Detection bias probably cannot account for the increased PD risk during the long-term follow-up.
PubMed: 38952571
DOI: 10.2147/CLEP.S463571 -
Frontiers in Aging Neuroscience 2024Studying the spatiotemporal patterns of amyloid accumulation in the brain over time is crucial in understanding Alzheimer's disease (AD). Positron Emission Tomography...
INTRODUCTION
Studying the spatiotemporal patterns of amyloid accumulation in the brain over time is crucial in understanding Alzheimer's disease (AD). Positron Emission Tomography (PET) imaging plays a pivotal role because it allows for the visualization and quantification of abnormal amyloid beta (Aβ) load in the living brain, providing a powerful tool for tracking disease progression and evaluating the efficacy of anti-amyloid therapies. Generative artificial intelligence (AI) can learn complex data distributions and generate realistic synthetic images. In this study, we demonstrate for the first time the potential of Generative Adversarial Networks (GANs) to build a low-dimensional representation space that effectively describes brain amyloid load and its dynamics.
METHODS
Using a cohort of 1,259 subjects with AV45 PET images from the Alzheimer's Disease Neuroimaging Initiative (ADNI), we develop a 3D GAN model to project images into a latent representation space and generate back synthetic images. Then, we build a progression model on the representation space based on non-parametric ordinary differential equations to study brain amyloid evolution.
RESULTS
We found that global SUVR can be accurately predicted with a linear regression model only from the latent representation space ( = 0.08 ± 0.01). We generated synthetic PET trajectories and illustrated predicted Aβ change in four years compared with actual progression.
DISCUSSION
Generative AI can generate rich representations for statistical prediction and progression modeling and simulate evolution in synthetic patients, providing an invaluable tool for understanding AD, assisting in diagnosis, and designing clinical trials. The aim of this study was to illustrate the huge potential that generative AI has in brain amyloid imaging and to encourage its advancement by providing use cases and ideas for future research tracks.
PubMed: 38952479
DOI: 10.3389/fnagi.2024.1410844 -
Aging & Mental Health Jul 2024The current study aimed to evaluate the relationship between subjective cognitive complaints (SCC) and compensatory strategy (CS) use in a diverse sample of non-Latinx...
OBJECTIVES
The current study aimed to evaluate the relationship between subjective cognitive complaints (SCC) and compensatory strategy (CS) use in a diverse sample of non-Latinx White (NLW), Black, and Latinx American older adults.
METHOD
807 older adults ( = 65.38, 62.7% female) were recruited through Amazon's Mechanical Turk (MTurk) and Qualtrics Panel to complete questionnaires on SCC and CS use. Kruskall-Wallis tests were used to evaluate differences in SCC across groups given non-normal distributions. Analysis of variance (ANOVA) was used to evaluate group differences in CS use. The PROCESS macro for SPSS was used to examine whether demographic factors moderated the relationship between SCC and CS use.
RESULTS
NLWs reported higher levels of SCC and greater overall use of CS in comparison to Latinx and Black individuals. Several demographic and psychosocial factors including age, ethno-racial group, education, and anxiety level were found to be associated with CS use. Education was found to moderate the association between SCC and CS use.
CONCLUSION
Inconsistent with prior studies, our study found that NLWs reported the highest levels of SCC. CS were used across all racial/ethnic groups, but the frequency of CS use may be impacted by education level. While all education groups increased their CS in response to higher levels of SCC, this increase was more substantial for those with lower levels of education. Future work should consider individuals' cultural and educational background when examining SCC and/or developing CS-based intervention for the aging population.
PubMed: 38952264
DOI: 10.1080/13607863.2024.2367060 -
Physical Chemistry Chemical Physics :... Jul 2024The hallmark of amyloidosis, such as Alzheimer's disease and Parkinson's disease, is the deposition of amyloid fibrils in various internal organs. The onset of the...
The hallmark of amyloidosis, such as Alzheimer's disease and Parkinson's disease, is the deposition of amyloid fibrils in various internal organs. The onset of the disease is related to the strength of cytotoxicity caused by toxic amyloid species. Furthermore, amyloid fibrils show polymorphism, where some types of fibrils are cytotoxic while others are not. It is thus essential to understand the molecular mechanism of cytotoxicity, part of which is caused by the interaction between amyloid polymorphic fibrils and cell membranes. Here, using amyloid polymorphs of hen egg white lysozyme, which is associated with hereditary systemic amyloidosis, showing different levels of cytotoxicity and liposomes of DMPC and DMPG, changes in the secondary structure of the polymorphs and the structural state of phospholipid membranes caused by the interaction were investigated using vacuum-ultraviolet circular dichroism (VUVCD) and Laurdan fluorescence measurements, respectively. Analysis has shown that the more cytotoxic polymorph increases the antiparallel β-sheet content and causes more disorder in the membrane structure while the other less cytotoxic polymorph shows the opposite structural changes and causes less structural disorder in the membrane. These results suggest a close correlation between the structural properties of amyloid fibrils and the degree of structural disorder of phospholipid membranes, both of which are involved in the fundamental process leading to amyloid cytotoxicity.
PubMed: 38952218
DOI: 10.1039/d4cp00965g -
Annals of Clinical and Translational... Jul 2024To examine the associations of renin-angiotensin system (RAS) inhibitor use with postmortem brain insulin signaling and neuropathology.
OBJECTIVE
To examine the associations of renin-angiotensin system (RAS) inhibitor use with postmortem brain insulin signaling and neuropathology.
METHODS
Among Religious Orders Study participants, 150 deceased and autopsied older individuals (75 with diabetes matched to 75 without by age at death, sex, and education) had measurements of insulin receptor substrate-1 (IRS-1) and RAC-alpha serine/threonine protein kinase (AKT1) collected in the prefrontal cortex using ELISA and immunohistochemistry. Alzheimer's disease (AD), brain infarcts, and cerebral vessel pathology data were assessed by systematic neuropathologic evaluations. RAS inhibitor use was determined based on visual inspection of medication containers during study visits. The associations of RAS inhibitor use with brain insulin signaling measures and neuropathology were examined using adjusted regression analyses.
RESULTS
Of the 90 RAS inhibitor users (54 with diabetes), 65 had used only angiotensin-converting enzyme inhibitors, 11 only angiotensin II receptor blockers, and 14 used both. RAS inhibitor use was associated with lower pTAKT1/total AKT1, but not with pSIRS-1/total IRS-1 or the density of cells stained positive for pS IRS-1. RAS inhibitor use was not associated with the level of global AD pathology or amyloid beta burden, but it was associated with a lower tau-neurofibrillary tangle density. Additionally, we found a significant interaction between diabetes and RAS inhibitors on tangle density. Furthermore, AKT1 phosphorylation partially mediated the association of RAS inhibitor use with tau tangle density. Lastly, RAS inhibitor use was associated with more atherosclerosis, but not with other cerebral blood vessel pathologies or cerebral infarcts.
INTERPRETATION
Late-life RAS inhibitor use may be associated with lower brain AKT1 phosphorylation and fewer neurofibrillary tangles.
PubMed: 38952081
DOI: 10.1002/acn3.52132