AAIC 2022 Research Highlights

Every year, the Alzheimer's Association brings together an amazing lineup for their AAIC conference. We hope you were able to attend some of the incredible sessions and exhibits at AAIC 2022.

Since AAIC is packed with exciting new AD & ADRD research, we thought we would share some research highlights from NACC and around the ADRC community that featured our UDS Data.

NACC Research Highlights

• Resistance and Resilience to Alzheimer’s Disease Pathology Associated with Lower Severity of Other Neuropathologic Diseases

  Jessica Culhane, Charles Mock, Kwun Chuen Gary Chan, PhD, Yen-Chi Chen, and Walter A. Kukull

  Resistance and resilience to ADNC is associated with lower odds of other neuropathologic disease, including Lewy bodies, LATE-NC, and cerebrovascular disease. This supports prior research indicating an interactive effect of multiple neuropathologic diseases on risk of dementia, and specifically that having LBD or LATE-NC contributes to the risk of developing Alzheimer’s dementia. Understanding how to prevent LBD, LATE-NC, and cerebrovascular disease could lead to higher resistance and resilience to Alzheimer’s dementia.

  
• Simultaneous mediation effect estimation of APOE through multiple neuropathological pathways on cognitive outcomes

  Fan Xia, Jessica E. Culhane, Kwun Chuen Gary Chan, C. Dirk Keene, and Walter A. Kukull

  Individual association of APOE with neuropathologies have been studied extensively, but the effects through multiple neuropathological pathways are rarely evaluated simultaneously. We utilize novel causal mediation analysis methods on neuropathology data to quantify the effects of APOE on dementia risk through different ADRD pathologies without requiring knowledge of their causal relationship. Most of the effect of the APOE e4 allele goes through ADNC, as expected, but there is also evidence of a smaller indirect effect through TDP43.

  
• Comparing characteristics among ADRC cohorts stratified by percentage of autopsied cases that were normal versus demented at visit prior to death

  Kathryn Gauthreaux, Peter T Nelson, Charles Mock, and Walter A. Kukull

  Dementia-enriched research studies and normal control-enriched research studies may have different recruitment models and thus differ in clinical and demographic characteristics which can contribute to different study findings and perspectives, so this analysis compared ADRC cohorts, parsed by the proportion of research volunteers in each cohort that were recruited in a cognitively normal state. ADRC autopsy cohorts with relatively high percentage of normal cognition at the time of recruitment were older, more female, and developed (while on study) more CVD symptoms, while autopsy cohorts that had higher percentage of cognitively impaired subjects at the time of recruitment had more DLB, more FTD/FTLD, and the participants had higher frequency of APOE e4 allele.

  
• Divergent patterns of cognitive deficits and structural brain alterations between older adults in mixed-sex and same-sex relationships

  Riccardo Manca Anthony N Correro II, Kathryn Gauthreaux, & Jason D Flatt Affiliate

  This analysis compared neuro-psychiatric symptoms (NPS) and regional grey matter (GM) volume/thickness; between people in same-sex relationships (SSR) and those in mixed-sex relationships (MSR)  and assessed the impact of NPS on cognitive testing and structural brain parameters. NPS predicted lower volume/thickness of fronto-temporal-cingular areas in the MSR group only, suggesting that NPS, then, may account for differences rather than relationship composition, and that mental health disparities may explain evidence of greater subjective cognitive decline in sexual and gender minority groups

  
• Development of harmonized and co-calibrated scores for memory, executive functioning, language, and visuospatial in the AIBL Study, ADNI, and NACC datasets

  Paul K. Crane, MD, MPH; Emily H. Trittschuh, PhD; Jesse B. Mez, MD, MS; Andrew J. Saykin, PsyD; R. Elizabeth Sanders, BA; Laura E Gibbons, PhD; Michael L. Lee, PhD, MPH; Phoebe Scollard, MA; Seo-Eun Choi, PhD; Stephanie Rainey-Smith, PhD; Cheyenne K Chooi, BSc (Hons); Brandon E Gavett, PhD; Paul Maruff, PhD; David Ames, MBBS, MD; Jessica E. Culhane, MS; Kathryn Gauthreaux, MS; Kwun Chuen Gary Chan, PhD; Sarah Biber, PhD; Kari Stephens, PhD; Walter A. Kukull, PhD; Logan Dumitrescu, PhD; Timothy J. Hohman, PhD; Shubhabrata Mukherjee, PhD, MS and Alzheimer’s Disease Neuroimaging Initiative

  ADRD-related studies around the world measure cognition using different batteries, and due to limited overlap in batteries across studies, it can be difficult to determine relationships; thus, this analysis used modern psychometric methods to address these challenges and produce harmonized and co-calibrated scores from AIBL, ADNI and NACC. Co-calibrated scores will be useful for investigators and to facilitate replication and joint analyses with combined data across multiple studies.

  
• Composite scores for memory, executive functioning, and language performance harmonized across waves from the National Alzheimer’s Coordinating Center (NACC)

  Michael Lee, Shubhabrata Mukherjee, Seo-Eun Choi, Phoebe Scollard, Elizabeth Sanders, Laura Gibbons, Jessica Culhane, Kathryn Gauthreaux, Kari Stephens, Kwun Chuen Gary Chan, Sarah Biber, Emily H Trittschuh, Jesse Mez, Andrew Saykin, Walter Kukull, Timothy Hohman, Paul Crane

  Alzheimer’s Disease Centers and Research Centers (ADRCs) collect standardized data and report them centrally to the National Alzheimer’s Coordinating Center (NACC). The cognitive battery has been modified several times over the years. We developed harmonized and calibrated composite scores for three cognitive subdomains for all participants and visits prior to March 2021 . Co-calibrated composite scores for memory, executive functioning, and language allow for comparisons and analysis across UDS 1/2 and UDS 3, allows for larger sample sizes and longer follow-up periods.