There are many active research projects accessing and applying shared ADNI data. Use the search above to find specific research focuses on the active ADNI investigations. This information is requested annually as a requirement for data access.
| Principal Investigator | |
| Principal Investigator's Name: | Ignacio Illán-Gala |
| Institution: | Hospital de la Santa Creu i Sant Pau |
| Department: | Neurology |
| Country: | |
| Proposed Analysis: | Neuroimaging studies are valuable tools for the characterization of Alzheimer's disease in the clinical continuum. Particularly, at the dementia stage, patients with Alzheimer´s disease present a posterior pattern of atrophy. However, the patterns of atrophy are highly heterogeneous and it is impossible to predict Alzheimer´s disease pathology based on the topography of neurodegeneration. We and others have recently shown that diffusion imaging can be used to measure the structural organization of the cerebral cortex and that such changes may reveal pathology that is not detected with cortical thickness measurements. Importantly, previous pathological studies have demonstrated that Alzheimer´s disease and other neurodegenerative and non-neurodegenerative conditions are characterized by a preferential involvement of gray matter or subcortical white matter, suggesting that the combination of cortical and white matter measures of cerebral integrity may provide important clues to underlying pathology. Taken together, previous evidence suggests that the combination of a sensitive measure of cortical microstructure (cortical mean diffusivity) with a measure of subcortical white matter integrity (subcortical white matter mean diffusivity structural) could provide important clues for the in-vivo identification of underlying pathology in the dementia of the Alzheimer´s type, primary progressive aphasia, and mild cognitive impairment. We have preliminary data showing that the combination of cortical mean diffusivity and subcortical white matter mean diffusivity is able to predict AD pathology by unveiling a preferential involvement of gray matter. The main aim of our project would be to determine the diagnostic value of the combination of cortical mean diffusivity and subcortical white matter mean diffusivity to differentiate prodromal Alzheimer´s disease from mild cognitive impairment without underlying Alzheimer´s disease. |
| Additional Investigators |
