MRI-guided clustering of patients with mild dementia due to Alzheimer's disease using self-organizing maps.

Introduction: Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a phenotypically and pathologically heterogenous neurodegenerative disorder. This heterogeneity can be studied and disentangled using data-driven clustering techniques.

Methods: We implemented a self-organizing map clustering algorithm on baseline volumetric MRI measures from nine brain regions of interest (ROIs) to cluster 1041 individuals enrolled in the placebo arm of the EXPEDITION3 trial.

Consuming Pecans as a Snack Improves Lipids/Lipoproteins and Diet Quality Compared to Usual Diet in Adults at Increased Risk for Cardiometabolic Diseases: A Randomized Controlled Trial.

Background: The vascular and cardiometabolic effects of pecans are relatively under-studied.

Objectives: The aim was to examine how substitution of usual snack foods with 57 g/day of pecans affects vascular health, risk factors for cardiometabolic diseases and diet quality, compared to continuing usual intake in individuals at risk for cardiometabolic diseases.

Methods: A 12-week single-blinded, parallel, randomized controlled trial was conducted.

Persistent changes in the dorsal root ganglion nociceptor translatome governs hyperalgesic priming in mice: roles of GPR88 and Meteorin.

Hyperalgesic priming is a model system that has been widely used to understand plasticity in painful stimulus-detecting sensory neurons, called nociceptors. A key feature of this model system is that following priming, stimuli that do not normally cause hyperalgesia now readily provoke this state. We hypothesized that hyperalgesic priming occurs because of reorganization of translation of mRNA in nociceptors.

Comparative transcriptomic rhythms in the mouse and human prefrontal cortex.

Introduction: Alterations in multiple subregions of the human prefrontal cortex (PFC) have been heavily implicated in psychiatric diseases. Moreover, emerging evidence suggests that circadian rhythms in gene expression are present across the brain, including in the PFC, and that these rhythms are altered in disease. However, investigation into the potential circadian mechanisms underlying these diseases in animal models must contend with the fact that the human PFC is highly evolved and specialized relative to that of rodents.

Cross-Sectional Comparison of Structural MRI Markers of Impairment in a Diverse Cohort of Older Adults.

Neurodegeneration is presumed to be the pathological process measure most proximal to clinical symptom onset in Alzheimer Disease (AD). Structural MRI is routinely collected in research and clinical trial settings. Several quantitative MRI-based measures of atrophy have been proposed, but their low correspondence with each other has been previously documented.