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Tau PET patterns mirror clinical and neuroanatomical variability in Alzheimer's disease
Ossenkoppele R et al.. Brain, 2016-03-08
Topic: Amyloid, tau and blood-test diagnosis
Using PET brain scans, researchers found that where tau protein tangles build up in the brain closely tracks which brain regions lose function and matches a person's specific symptoms (memory loss vs. language problems vs. visual problems), much more closely than where amyloid plaques sit. This suggests tau location, not amyloid location, explains why different people with Alzheimer's have different symptoms.
Key findings
- Tau-PET uptake was strongly linked to local loss of brain glucose metabolism (r=-0.49), a marker of neurodegeneration
- Amyloid-PET uptake was only weakly linked to glucose metabolism (r=0.16)
- Patients with different clinical AD variants (memory-predominant, visual, language) showed tau concentrated in the brain regions matching their specific symptoms
- APOE ε4 carriers had greater tau uptake in temporal and parietal regions than non-carriers
Why it matters
Where tau tangles build up tracked local loss of brain glucose metabolism and matched each person's specific symptoms far more closely than where amyloid plaques sat. This supports tau location, rather than amyloid location, as the better explanation for why people with Alzheimer's have different symptoms.
Study details
- Study designcross-sectional
- Participants35
- Effect sizer = -0.49 ± 0.07 for tau vs glucose metabolism (P<0.001); r = 0.16 ± 0.09 for amyloid vs glucose metabolism (P<0.001)
- Evidence strengthModerate
Limitations
Small sample (n=35), single-center, cross-sectional design with no longitudinal follow-up to confirm causality or spreading over time.
How this study scored 55/100
Published in a leading specialty journal, and it is a snapshot of people at one point in time. Scored zero for randomised / blinded and indexed in PubMed because the record does not state it. We have no data on journal's citation record, times cited, citations per year, impact for its field and year, still being cited, senior author's track record, institution's track record, multi-centre collaboration and free to read, so those were left out: it earned 34 of the 62 points we could judge it on, which is 55 out of 100.
| Component | Points | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Journal tier | 9 / 10 | Tier 2 — leading specialty journal (Brain) |
| Journal's citation record | — / 4 | No journal record from OpenAlex — left out of this score |
| Study design | 4 / 12 | A snapshot of people at one point in time |
| Strength of evidence | 3 / 5 | Rated “moderate” in our summary |
| Peer-review validation | 10 / 10 | Peer-reviewed. Published as an article in a named peer-reviewed journal. |
| How recent | 1 / 5 | 2016 — within 20 year(s) of the newest study here |
| Sample size | 1 / 4 | 35 participants |
| Effect reported | 3 / 3 | Effect reported with a statistic (interval, p-value, ratio or similar) |
| Studied in people | 3 / 3 | Studied in people (participant count stated) |
| Randomised / blinded | 0 / 2 | No randomisation or blinding stated — scores zero (not stated in the record — scored 0) |
| Times cited | — / 7 | No citation count (not found in OpenAlex) — left out of this score |
| Citations per year | — / 5 | No citation count or no year — left out of this score |
| Impact for its field and year | — / 6 | No field-weighted citation impact (OpenAlex has none yet) — left out of this score |
| Cited by studies here | 0 / 6 | No other study in this library cites it |
| Still being cited | — / 4 | No yearly citation counts — left out of this score |
| Senior author's track record | — / 4 | Senior author's record not available — left out of this score |
| Institution's track record | — / 3 | No institution listed in OpenAlex — left out of this score |
| Multi-centre collaboration | — / 3 | Institutions not listed — left out of this score |
| Indexed in PubMed | 0 / 2 | No PubMed ID and no DOI — scores zero (not stated in the record — scored 0) |
| Free to read | — / 2 | Access not recorded — left out of this score |
| Points | 34 / 62 | Scored on 11 of 20 parts. We have no data for the rest, so they are left out: 34 of the 62 points we could judge it on is 55 out of 100. |
| Total | 55 / 100 | — |
What each of these 20 components measures, and what this score is not →
Read the original
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Cite this study APA, Vancouver, BibTeX · download .bib or .ris
Built from the record alzhub holds for this paper, not looked up. This record has no DOI, so the citation leaves it out. Volume, issue and page numbers are not held in the record. The record's author list ends in “et al.”, so not every author is named. Check the citation against the original before you use it.
APA 7th
Ossenkoppele, R., et al. (2016). Tau PET patterns mirror clinical and neuroanatomical variability in Alzheimer's disease. Brain.
Vancouver
Ossenkoppele R, et al. Tau PET patterns mirror clinical and neuroanatomical variability in Alzheimer's disease. Brain. 2016.
BibTeX
@article{ossenkoppele2016-b20586df,
author = {Ossenkoppele, R. and others},
title = {{Tau PET patterns mirror clinical and neuroanatomical variability in Alzheimer's disease}},
journal = {Brain},
year = {2016}
}
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