Identification and In Vitro and In Vivo Characterization of KAC-50.1 as a Potential α-Synuclein PET Radioligand.

The accumulation of aggregated α-synuclein (α-syn) is a pathological hallmark of Parkinson's disease (PD) and other synucleinopathies. Here within, we report the in vitro characterization targeting site 2 of α-syn fibrils and in vivo evaluation of NHPs of KAC-50.1 as a potential α-syn positron emission tomography (PET) radioligand.

Clinical correlates of dopamine transporter availability in cross-sectional and longitudinal studies with [F]FE-PE2I PET: independent validation with new insights.

[F]FE-PE2I PET is a promising alternative to single positron emission computed tomography-based dopamine transporter (DAT) imaging in Parkinson's disease. While the excellent discriminative power of [F]FE-PE2I PET has been established, so far only one study has reported meaningful associations between motor severity scores and DAT availability. In this study, we use high-resolution (∼3 mm isotropic) PET to provide an independent validation for the clinical correlates of [F]FE-PE2I imaging in separate cross-sectional (28 participants with Parkinson's disease, Hoehn-Yahr: 2 and 14 healthy individuals) and longitudinal (initial results from 6 participants with Parkinson's disease with 2-year follow-up) cohorts.

Synaptic loss and its association with symptom severity in Parkinson's disease.

Parkinson's disease (PD) is the fastest growing neurodegenerative disease, but at present there is no cure, nor any disease-modifying treatments. Synaptic biomarkers from in vivo imaging have shown promise in imaging loss of synapses in PD and other neurodegenerative disorders. Here, we provide new clinical insights from a cross-sectional, high-resolution positron emission tomography (PET) study of 30 PD individuals and 30 age- and sex-matched healthy controls (HC) with the radiotracer [C]UCB-J, which binds to synaptic vesicle glycoprotein 2A (SV2A), and is therefore, a biomarker of synaptic density in the living brain.