Digital Phenotyping of Parkinson's Disease via Natural Language Processing.

Frontostriatal degeneration in Parkinson's disease (PD) is associated with language deficits, which can be identified using natural language processing, a remarkable tool for digital phenotyping. Current evidence is limited in linguistic coverage and mostly blind to the disorder's cognitive phenotypes. We validated an AI-driven approach to capture digital language markers of PD with and without mild cognitive impairment (PD-MCI, PD-nMCI) relative to healthy controls (HCs).

Towards Parkinson's Disease Detection Through Analysis of Everyday Handwriting.

Parkinson's disease (PD) is the second most prevalent neurodegenerative disorder worldwide. People suffering from PD exhibit motor symptoms that affect the control of upper and lower limb movement. Among daily activities that depend on proper upper limb control is the handwriting process, which has been studied in state-of-the-art research, mainly considering non-semantic drawings like spirals, geometric figures, cursive lines, and others.

Structural inequality linked to brain volume and network dynamics in aging and dementia across the Americas.

Structural inequality, the uneven distribution of resources and opportunities, influences health outcomes. However, the biological embedding of structural inequality in aging and dementia, especially among underrepresented populations, is unclear. We examined the association between structural inequality (country-level and state-level Gini indices) and brain volume and connectivity in 2,135 healthy controls, and individuals with Alzheimer's disease and frontotemporal lobe degeneration from Latin America and the United States.

Neural dynamics of social verb processing: an MEG study.

Human vocabularies include specific words to communicate interpersonal behaviors, a core linguistic function mainly afforded by social verbs (SVs). This skill has been proposed to engage dedicated systems subserving social knowledge. Yet, neurocognitive evidence is scarce, and no study has examined spectro-temporal and spatial signatures of SV access.

Bilinguals on the footbridge: the role of foreign-language proficiency in moral decision making.

Socio-cognitive research on bilinguals points to a moral foreign-language effect (MFLE), with more utilitarian choices (e.g., sacrificing someone to save more people) for moral dilemmas presented in the second language (L2) relative to the first language.

Cross-Linguistic Analysis of Speech Markers: Insights from English, Chinese, and Italian Speakers.

Cross-linguistic studies with healthy individuals are vital, as they can reveal typologically common and different patterns while providing tailored benchmarks for patient studies. Nevertheless, cross-linguistic differences in narrative speech production, particularly among speakers of languages belonging to distinct language families, have been inadequately investigated. Using a picture description task, we analyze cross-linguistic variations in connected speech production across three linguistically diverse groups of cognitively normal participants-English, Chinese (Mandarin and Cantonese), and Italian speakers.

Semantic memory navigation in HIV: Conceptual associations and word selection patterns.

This proof-of-concept study aimed to characterize semantic memory profiles in individuals with human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) and mild neurocognitive impairment. Using a semantic relatedness task, we explored conceptual association and word selection patterns in people living with HIV (PLWH;  = 50) relative to people living without HIV ( = 46). We also studied whether word selection patterns in the PLWH group were associated with working memory capacity, cognitive flexibility and inhibitory control.

Toolkit to Examine Lifelike Language v.2.0: Optimizing Speech Biomarkers of Neurodegeneration.

Introduction: The Toolkit to Examine Lifelike Language (TELL) is a web-based application providing speech biomarkers of neurodegeneration. After deployment of TELL v.1.

Brain clocks capture diversity and disparities in aging and dementia across geographically diverse populations.

Brain clocks, which quantify discrepancies between brain age and chronological age, hold promise for understanding brain health and disease. However, the impact of diversity (including geographical, socioeconomic, sociodemographic, sex and neurodegeneration) on the brain-age gap is unknown. We analyzed datasets from 5,306 participants across 15 countries (7 Latin American and Caribbean countries (LAC) and 8 non-LAC countries).

Educational disparities in brain health and dementia across Latin America and the United States.

Background: Education influences brain health and dementia. However, its impact across regions, specifically Latin America (LA) and the United States (US), is unknown.

Methods: A total of 1412 participants comprising controls, patients with Alzheimer's disease (AD), and frontotemporal lobar degeneration (FTLD) from LA and the US were included.

Brain clocks capture diversity and disparity in aging and dementia.

Brain clocks, which quantify discrepancies between brain age and chronological age, hold promise for understanding brain health and disease. However, the impact of multimodal diversity (geographical, socioeconomic, sociodemographic, sex, neurodegeneration) on the brain age gap (BAG) is unknown. Here, we analyzed datasets from 5,306 participants across 15 countries (7 Latin American countries -LAC, 8 non-LAC).

How clinical decision tasks modulate emotional related EEG responses in nursing students.

Healthcare professionals play a vital role in conveying sensitive information as patients undergo stressful, demanding situations. However, the underlying neurocognitive dynamics in routine clinical tasks remain underexplored, creating gaps in healthcare research and social cognition models. Here, we examined whether the type of clinical task may differentially affect the emotional processing of nursing students in response to the emotional reactions of patients.

Automated free speech analysis reveals distinct markers of Alzheimer's and frontotemporal dementia.

Dementia can disrupt how people experience and describe events as well as their own role in them. Alzheimer's disease (AD) compromises the processing of entities expressed by nouns, while behavioral variant frontotemporal dementia (bvFTD) entails a depersonalized perspective with increased third-person references. Yet, no study has examined whether these patterns can be captured in connected speech via natural language processing tools.

Advancements in dementia research, diagnostics, and care in Latin America: Highlights from the 2023 Alzheimer's Association International conference satellite symposium in Mexico City.

Introduction: While Latin America (LatAm) is facing an increasing burden of dementia due to the rapid aging of the population, it remains underrepresented in dementia research, diagnostics, and care.

Methods: In 2023, the Alzheimer's Association hosted its eighth satellite symposium in Mexico, highlighting emerging dementia research, priorities, and challenges within LatAm.

Results: Significant initiatives in the region, including intracountry support, showcased their efforts in fostering national and international collaborations; genetic studies unveiled the unique genetic admixture in LatAm; researchers conducting emerging clinical trials discussed ongoing culturally specific interventions; and the urgent need to harmonize practices and studies, improve diagnosis and care, and use affordable biomarkers in the region was highlighted.

Embodied cognition comes of age: A processing advantage for action words is modulated by aging and the task.

Processing action words (e.g., ) engages neurocognitive motor representations, consistent with embodied cognition principles.

Brain health in diverse settings: How age, demographics and cognition shape brain function.

Diversity in brain health is influenced by individual differences in demographics and cognition. However, most studies on brain health and diseases have typically controlled for these factors rather than explored their potential to predict brain signals. Here, we assessed the role of individual differences in demographics (age, sex, and education; n = 1298) and cognition (n = 725) as predictors of different metrics usually used in case-control studies.

Switching off: disruptive TMS reveals distinct contributions of the posterior middle temporal gyrus and angular gyrus to bilingual speech production.

The role of the left temporoparietal cortex in speech production has been extensively studied during native language processing, proving crucial in controlled lexico-semantic retrieval under varying cognitive demands. Yet, its role in bilinguals, fluent in both native and second languages, remains poorly understood. Here, we employed continuous theta burst stimulation to disrupt neural activity in the left posterior middle-temporal gyrus (pMTG) and angular gyrus (AG) while Italian-Friulian bilinguals performed a cued picture-naming task.

Decoding bilingualism from resting-state oscillatory network organization.

Can lifelong bilingualism be robustly decoded from intrinsic brain connectivity? Can we determine, using a spectrally resolved approach, the oscillatory networks that better predict dual-language experience? We recorded resting-state magnetoencephalographic activity in highly proficient Spanish-Basque bilinguals and Spanish monolinguals, calculated functional connectivity at canonical frequency bands, and derived topological network properties using graph analysis. These features were fed into a machine learning classifier to establish how robustly they discriminated between the groups. The model showed excellent classification (AUC: 0.

Discriminating nonfluent/agrammatic and logopenic PPA variants with automatically extracted morphosyntactic measures from connected speech.

Morphosyntactic assessments are important for characterizing individuals with nonfluent/agrammatic variant primary progressive aphasia (nfvPPA). Yet, standard tests are subject to examiner bias and often fail to differentiate between nfvPPA and logopenic variant PPA (lvPPA). Moreover, relevant neural signatures remain underexplored.

Electrophysiological alterations during action semantic processing in Parkinson's disease.

Assessments of action semantics consistently reveal markers of Parkinson's disease (PD). However, neurophysiological signatures of the domain remain under-examined in this population, especially under conditions that allow patients to process stimuli without stringent time constraints. Here we assessed event-related potentials and time-frequency modulations in healthy individuals (HPs) and PD patients during a delayed-response semantic judgment task involving related and unrelated action-picture pairs.

Neurocognitive correlates of semantic memory navigation in Parkinson's disease.

Cognitive studies on Parkinson's disease (PD) reveal abnormal semantic processing. Most research, however, fails to indicate which conceptual properties are most affected and capture patients' neurocognitive profiles. Here, we asked persons with PD, healthy controls, and individuals with behavioral variant frontotemporal dementia (bvFTD, as a disease control group) to read concepts (e.