Publications by authors named "Sophie A Bell"
Background: DNA methylation (DNAm) age measures, or 'epigenetic clocks', surpass chronological age in their ability to predict age-related morbidities and mortality. The Louisville Twin Study (LTS) presents an opportunity to clarify the role of early life environmental exposures and development in biological and cognitive aging in midlife. We expect that second-generation DNAm age measures trained to predict age related outcomes and death, independent of chronological age, will be sensitive to cognitive ability in midlife.
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- - Loneliness has a complex genetic basis, affecting gene expression linked to inflammation and immune response, but previous studies hadn’t explored how DNA methylation patterns relate to this.
- - In a study involving 281 adult twins' DNA, researchers found no significant methylation differences at the genome-wide level, but identified 25 suggestive sites associated with genes related to inflammation.
- - The study showed a strong correlation between loneliness and accelerated epigenetic aging, indicating that higher loneliness levels might reflect faster biological aging across various systems in the body.
Article Synopsis
- This study focused on developing composite scores for two new cognitive assessments aimed at early-stage Alzheimer's disease (AD) to evaluate their effectiveness and compare them with traditional measures.
- Researchers analyzed data from 291 older adults to assess the reliability and validity of the new assessments, utilizing exploratory factor analyses to understand their structure.
- The findings indicated that the new measures, No Practice Effect (NPE) and Miami Computerized Functional Skills Assessment, have superior psychometric properties and stronger links to AD risk markers, suggesting their potential use in clinical trials for early Alzheimer's detection.
Sleep and related disorders could lead to changes in various brain networks, but little is known about the role of amyloid β (Aβ) burden-a key Alzheimer's disease (AD) biomarker-in the relationship between sleep disturbance and altered resting state functional connectivity (rsFC) in older adults. This cross-sectional study examined the association between sleep disturbance, Aβ burden, and rsFC using a large-scale dataset from the Alzheimer's Disease Neuroimaging Initiative (ADNI). Sample included 489 individuals (53.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIntroduction: Assessment of cognition and everyday function is essential in clinical trials for Alzheimer's disease (AD). Two novel measures of cognition (No Practice Effects (NPE) cognitive battery and Miami Computerized Functional Assessment Scale (CFAS)) were designed to have robust psychometric properties and reduced practice and ceiling effects. This study aims to evaluate if the NPE and CFAS demonstrate stronger psychometric properties and reduced practice effects compared with established measures, including the Preclinical Alzheimer Cognitive Composite (PACC), Alzheimer's Disease Assessment Scale-Cognitive Subscale (ADAS-Cog), and Functional Activities Questionnaire (FAQ).
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