Topic: Cognitive Impairment

ePoster
23 ePosters
Seminar
15 seminars
Grant
3 grants

Latest

GrantNeuroscience

Neuroinflammation in Cerebral Small Vessel Disease

National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke
May 31, 2031

Project Summary/Abstract Cerebral small vessel disease (cSVD) is a leading cause of vascular contributions to cognitive impairment and dementia (VCID), which is the 2nd leading cause of dementia and a significant contributor to Alzheimer’s disease (AD). Thus far, the underlying pathogenesis of cSVD is poorly understood. Several lines of evidence, including animal models, postmortem human brain pathology, and systemic inflammatory markers, demonstrated the damaging role of chronic neuroinflammation in cSVD. Direct evidence of neuroinflammation at the tissue level in patients with cSVD is still critically needed. The sphingosine-1-phosphate receptor 1 (S1PR1) regulates neuroinflammation through microglial and astrocyte activation and trafficking and has emerged as a promising target for neuroinflammation. In postmortem brains of patients with cSVD, we observed elevated S1PR1 expression and colocalization of S1PR1 with astrocytes and microglia. A novel 11C-CS1P1 PET radiotracer with high affinity and specificity targeting S1PR1 has been recently developed and validated in animal models and post-mortem human specimens. Under an FDA-approved eIND (IND 146548), we have successfully completed the safety and dosimetry study in healthy participants and performed preliminary studies in patients with cSVD. We found that 11C-CS1P1 PET uptake is significantly associated with WMH lesion burden in patients with cSVD after controlling for age, sex, race, vascular risk factors, and amyloid deposition. We hypothesize that 11C-CS1P1 PET uptake is a tissue-level biomarker of neuroinflammation to provide insight into cSVD severity, progression, and prognosis. We will 1) evaluate the relationship between 11C-CS1P1 PET uptake and cSVD neuroimaging abnormalities and cognitive impairment, 2) evaluate the test-retest repeatability and longitudinal evolution, and 3) determine whether 11C-CS1P1 PET uptake at baseline predict cSVD progression. The successful completion of this study will establish 11C-CS1P1 PET as an neuroinflammation imaging biomarker and investigate the role of neuroinflammation in cSVD pathogenesis and progression. It will lay a foundation for developing future therapies in modulating neuroinflammation.

GrantNeuroscience

Mechanisms and consequences of cerebrovascular dysfunction in preeclampsia

National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke
May 31, 2030

PROJECT SUMMARY/ABSTRACT Preeclampsia (PE) is a common hypertensive disorder of pregnancy that causes significant maternal and fetal morbidity and mortality worldwide. PE women are at a high risk of stroke, including intracerebral hemorrhage, during the peripartum period, suggesting the sequelae of PE adversely impacts the cerebral circulation to promote hemorrhage. In addition, women with severe early-onset PE are at an 85-fold increased risk of death from intracerebral hemorrhage, importantly suggesting severity of disease promotes greater vulnerability of the cerebral circulation to degradation and rupture. However, the consequences of PE extend far beyond pregnancy and are associated with excessive cardiovascular and cerebrovascular disease risk later in life. Women with previous pregnancy complicated by PE can develop cognitive impairment as early as in their 30’s and 40’s, suggesting PE predisposes the brain to early-onset cognitive impairment. Studies have shown that formerly PE women have changes in gray matter volume and increased white matter lesion burden that occurs as a function of time from pregnancy, suggesting that PE continues to progressively damage the brain long after the affected pregnancy. Thus, our overall goal is to elucidate mechanisms by which women with PE are at risk of intracerebral hemorrhage in pregnancy and cognitive decline later in life. Our preliminary studies found greater vascular degradation, hematoma and cerebral edema in a model of severe PE that was associated with vascular inflammation and microglia activation (neuroinflammation). In addition, we found endothelial dysfunction and diminished neurovascular coupling in PE rats that persisted 5 months postpartum. Impaired neurovascular coupling is well-recognized as an underlying contributor to cognitive decline. These effects in postpartum animals with previous exposure to PE were associated with memory impairment that was not present in the pregnant state, suggesting neurovascular dysfunction precedes cognitive decline. Our central hypothesis is that the sequela of PE accelerates hypertension-induced cerebrovascular dysfunction that predisposes to intracerebral hemorrhage during pregnancy and its persistence postpartum results in early-onset cognitive decline. We will therefore elucidate mechanisms by which PE accelerates vascular degradation and worsens outcome from hemorrhagic stroke, probing pathways involved in oxidative degradative processes using multi-omics and multivariate analysis (Aim 1). We will also determine underlying molecular mechanisms that cause persistent cerebral microvascular dysfunction and cognitive decline postpartum, including oxidative stress-induced BBB leakage and persistent neuroinflammation that drives potassium channel dysfunction, reduced neurovascular coupling and neurovascular uncoupling (Aim 2). We will also use machine learning approaches together with multi-omics and outcome measures to identify factors and cellular pathways that are most impactful for prediction of intracerebral hemorrhage and cognitive impairment. The ability to predict and prevent devasting neurovascular disorders associated with PE has the potential to have long-lasting impacts on the lives of women with PE.

GrantNeuroscience

Impact of environmental toxicants on frontal cortical circuits

National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences
Jun 10, 2028

Abstract: Human mercury (Hg) exposure has been known for many decades to produce cognitive impairment and mood disorder symptoms. Hg is a global pollutant that poses widespread potential for neurotoxic exposure, earning it a position on the WHO’s list of the top 10 chemicals of major public health concern. However, little is known about the neural mechanisms that lead to neuropsychiatric symptoms from Hg exposure. The objective of this application is to identify specific mechanisms, within the neocortical circuits that control emotion and cognition, that are disrupted by the neurotoxicant, methylmercury (MeHg). The neocortex exhibits especially strong bioaccumulation of Hg, magnifying the risk to these circuits. Therefore, we hypothesize that chronic MeHg exposure leads to persistent circuit dysfunction in prefrontal and insular cortices (mPFC and aIC) – two brain regions critical in control of emotion and cognition. Our recent work showed that mPFC neurons in brain slices are negatively affected by acute MeHg exposure, resulting in hyperexcitability and altered synaptic transmission. Currently, it unknown how these acute effects on synaptic transmission translate to altered neuronal function in vivo. This proposal applies an integrative approach to determine the in vivo effects of MeHg on mPFC and aIC circuits, at the systems neurophysiology, synaptic and molecular levels. We will compare the effects of MeHg exposure on in vivo spiking activity patterns in brain regions of the mPFC-aIC circuit, using multiunit electrophysiological recordings in awake animals. Action potentials will be recorded simultaneously from multiple neurons, distributed across cortical layers, to evaluate effects on spike frequency, temporal patterning and correlation. Using acute brain slices derived from animals chronically treated with MeHg in vivo, electrophysiologically recorded synaptic estimates will be made to compare the effects of MeHg exposure on synaptic transmission and EI-balance within brain regions of the mPFC-aIC circuit. Based on previous evidence, we hypothesize that TDP-43 hyper-phosphorylation and aggregation link MeHg exposure to mPFC and aIC dysfunction. Therefore, immunohistochemistry will be used to measure TDP-43 hyper-phosphorylation and nuclear redistribution from animals treated in vivo +/- MeHg. In addition, tissue will be co-labeled with antibodies for nPAS4, a well-stablished molecular marker of activity, to determine whether TDP-43 hallmarks correlate with MeHg-induced hyper-excitability. The results of our study will substantively improve our mechanistic understanding of how Hg disrupts frontal cortical function and contribute to our understanding of the biological basis of emotional and cognitive sympoms. Identifying specific actions of MeHg at the functional microcircuitry level and cellular/molecular level will help significantly in finding novel targets for therapeutic interventions. If our hypothesis is correct, this will also raise the question of the extent to which chronic low-level environmental mercury exposure contributes to the etiology of fronto-cortical disorders with symptoms that overlap mercury exposure but do not have definitive genetic origins. This is particularly important because fronto-cortical disorders are predominantly sporadic in nature.

SeminarNeuroscience

Soft Discrimination of Healthy Controls and Patients with Mild Cognitive Impairment Based on EEG Data

Tongtong Li
Michigan State
Dec 14, 2023
SeminarNeuroscience

Obesity and Brain – Bidirectional Influences

Alain Dagher
McGill University
Apr 11, 2023

The regulation of body weight relies on homeostatic mechanisms that use a combination of internal signals and external cues to initiate and terminate food intake. Homeostasis depends on intricate communication between the body and the hypothalamus involving numerous neural and hormonal signals. However, there is growing evidence that higher-level cognitive function may also influence energy balance. For instance, research has shown that BMI is consistently linked to various brain, cognitive, and personality measures, implicating executive, reward, and attentional systems. Moreover, the rise in obesity rates over the past half-century is attributed to the affordability and widespread availability of highly processed foods, a phenomenon that contradicts the idea that food intake is solely regulated by homeostasis. I will suggest that prefrontal systems involved in value computation and motivation act to limit food overconsumption when food is scarce or expensive, but promote over-eating when food is abundant, an optimum strategy from an economic standpoint. I will review the genetic and neuroscience literature on the CNS control of body weight. I will present recent studies supporting a role of prefrontal systems in weight control. I will also present contradictory evidence showing that frontal executive and cognitive findings in obesity may be a consequence not a cause of increased hunger. Finally I will review the effects of obesity on brain anatomy and function. Chronic adiposity leads to cerebrovascular dysfunction, cortical thinning, and cognitive impairment. As the most common preventable risk factor for dementia, obesity poses a significant threat to brain health. I will conclude by reviewing evidence for treatment of obesity in adults to prevent brain disease.

SeminarNeuroscience

Integrating theory-guided and data-driven approaches for measuring consciousness

Nao Tsuchiya
Monash Institute of Cognitive and Clinical Neurosciences, Monash University
Aug 31, 2022

Clinical assessment of consciousness is a significant issue, with recent research suggesting some brain-damaged patients who are assessed as unconscious are in fact conscious. Misdiagnosis of consciousness can also be detrimental when it comes to general anaesthesia, causing numerous psychological problems, including post-traumatic stress disorder. Avoiding awareness with overdose of anaesthetics, however, can also lead to cognitive impairment. Currently available objective assessment of consciousness is limited in accuracy or requires expensive equipment with major barriers to translation. In this talk, we will outline our recent theory-guided and data-driven approaches to develop new, optimized consciousness measures that will be robustly evaluated on an unprecedented breadth of high-quality neural data, recorded from the fly model system. We will overcome the subjective-choice problem in data-driven and theory-guided approaches with a comprehensive data analytic framework, which has never been applied to consciousness detection, integrating previously disconnected streams of research in consciousness detection to accelerate the translation of objective consciousness measures into clinical settings.

SeminarNeuroscience

Western diet consumption and memory impairment: what, when, and how?

Scott Kanoski
University of Southern California
May 17, 2022

Habitual consumption of a “Western diet”, containing higher than recommended levels of simple sugars and saturated fatty acids, is associated with cognitive impairments in humans and in various experimental animal models. Emerging findings reveal that the specific mnemonic processes that are disrupted by Western diet consumption are those that rely on the hippocampus, a brain region classically linked with memory control and more recently with the higher-order control of food intake. Our laboratory has established rat models in which excessive consumption of different components of a Western diet during the juvenile and adolescent periods of development yields long-term impairments in hippocampal-dependent memory function without concomitant increases in total caloric intake, body weight, or adiposity. Our ongoing work is investigating alterations in the gut microbiome as a potential underlying neurobiological mechanism linking early life unhealthy dietary factors to adverse neurocognitive outcomes.

SeminarNeuroscience

The Synaptome Architecture of the Brain: Lifespan, disease, evolution and behavior

Seth Grant
Professor of Molecular Neuroscience, Centre for Clinical Brain Sciences, University of Edinburgh, UK
May 2, 2022

The overall aim of my research is to understand how the organisation of the synapse, with particular reference to the postsynaptic proteome (PSP) of excitatory synapses in the brain, informs the fundamental mechanisms of learning, memory and behaviour and how these mechanisms go awry in neurological dysfunction. The PSP indeed bears a remarkable burden of disease, with components being disrupted in disorders (synaptopathies) including schizophrenia, depression, autism and intellectual disability. Our work has been fundamental in revealing and then characterising the unprecedented complexity (>1000 highly conserved proteins) of the PSP in terms of the subsynaptic architecture of postsynaptic proteins such as PSD95 and how these proteins assemble into complexes and supercomplexes in different neurons and regions of the brain. Characterising the PSPs in multiple species, including human and mouse, has revealed differences in key sets of functionally important proteins, correlates with brain imaging and connectome data, and a differential distribution of disease-relevant proteins and pathways. Such studies have also provided important insight into synapse evolution, establishing that vertebrate behavioural complexity is a product of the evolutionary expansion in synapse proteomes that occurred ~500 million years ago. My lab has identified many mutations causing cognitive impairments in mice before they were found to cause human disorders. Our proteomic studies revealed that >130 brain diseases are caused by mutations affecting postsynaptic proteins. We uncovered mechanisms that explain the polygenic basis and age of onset of schizophrenia, with postsynaptic proteins, including PSD95 supercomplexes, carrying much of the polygenic burden. We discovered the “Genetic Lifespan Calendar”, a genomic programme controlling when genes are regulated. We showed that this could explain how schizophrenia susceptibility genes are timed to exert their effects in young adults. The Genes to Cognition programme is the largest genetic study so far undertaken into the synaptic molecular mechanisms underlying behaviour and physiology. We made important conceptual advances that inform how the repertoire of both innate and learned behaviours is built from unique combinations of postsynaptic proteins that either amplify or attenuate the behavioural response. This constitutes a key advance in understanding how the brain decodes information inherent in patterns of nerve impulses, and provides insight into why the PSP has evolved to be so complex, and consequently why the phenotypes of synaptopathies are so diverse. Our most recent work has opened a new phase, and scale, in understanding synapses with the first synaptome maps of the brain. We have developed next-generation methods (SYNMAP) that enable single-synapse resolution molecular mapping across the whole mouse brain and extensive regions of the human brain, revealing the molecular and morphological features of a billion synapses. This has already uncovered unprecedented spatiotemporal synapse diversity organised into an architecture that correlates with the structural and functional connectomes, and shown how mutations that cause cognitive disorders reorganise these synaptome maps; for example, by detecting vulnerable synapse subtypes and synapse loss in Alzheimer’s disease. This innovative synaptome mapping technology has huge potential to help characterise how the brain changes during normal development, including in specific cell types, and with degeneration, facilitating novel pathways to diagnosis and therapy.

SeminarNeuroscience

Mapping Individual Trajectories of Structural and Cognitive Decline in Mild Cognitive Impairment

Shreya Rajagopal
Psychology, University of Michigan
Mar 25, 2022

The US has an aging population. For the first time in US history, the number of older adults is projected to outnumber that of children by 2034. This combined with the fact that the prevalence of Alzheimer's Disease increases exponentially with age makes for a worrying combination. Mild cognitive impairment (MCI) is an intermediate stage of cognitive decline between being cognitively normal and having full-blown Dementia, with every third person with MCI progressing to dementia of the Alzheimer's Type (DAT). While there is no known way to reverse symptoms once they begin, early prediction of disease can help stall its progression and help with early financial planning. While grey matter volume loss in the Hippocampus and Entorhinal Cortex (EC) are characteristic biomarkers of DAT, little is known about the rates of decrease of these volumes within individuals in MCI state across time. We used longitudinal growth curve models to map individual trajectories of volume loss in subjects with MCI. We then looked at whether these rates of volume decrease could predict progression to DAT right in the MCI stage. Finally, we evaluated whether these rates of Hippocampal and EC volume loss were correlated with individual rates of decline of episodic memory, visuospatial ability, and executive function.

SeminarNeuroscience

The Role of Cerebrovascular Pathology in Aging and Neurodegenerative Disease Populations

Mahsa Dadar
Assistant Professor, Department of Psychiatry, McGill University, Canada
Feb 23, 2022

Late-life cognitive impairment and dementia are heterogeneous and multifactorial conditions driven by a combination of genetic, vascular, and lifestyle-related factors. More than 75% of patients with dementia have evidence of cerebrovascular pathology at autopsy. Cerebrovascular disease lesions can be detected on structural MRI and used as biomarkers to determine the extent of cerebrovascular pathology. These biomarkers are associated with cognitive difficulties and increase the risk of dementia for the same level of neurodegenerative pathology. Given that some of the risk factors for cerebrovascular disease are potentially modifiable, identifying the role of cerebrovascular pathology in aging and neurodegenerative disease populations opens a window for prevention of cognitive decline and dementia.

SeminarNeuroscience

Multimorbidity in the ageing human brain: lessons from neuropathological assessment

Kirsty McAleese
Newcastle University
Jun 8, 2021

Age-associated dementias are neuropathologically characterized by the identification of hallmark intracellular and extracellular deposition of proteins, i.e., hyperphosphorylated-tau, amyloid-β, and α-synuclein, or cerebrovascular lesions. The neuropathological assessment and staging of these pathologies allows for a diagnosis of a distinct disease, e.g., amyloid-β plaques and hyperphosphorylated tau pathology in Alzheimer's disease. Neuropathological assessment in large scale cohorts, such as the UK’s Brains for Dementia Research (BDR) programme, has made it increasingly clear that the ageing brain is characterized by the presence of multiple age-associated pathologies rather than just the ‘pure’ hallmark lesion as commonly perceived. These additional pathologies can range from low/intermediate levels, that are assumed to have little if any clinical significance, to a full-blown mixed disease where there is the presence of two distinct diseases. In our recent paper (McAleese et al. 2021 Concomitant neurodegenerative pathologies contribute to the transition from mild cognitive impairment to dementia, https://alz-journals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/alz.12291, Alzheimer's & Dementia), using the BDR cohort, we investigated the frequency of multimorbidity and specifically investigated the impact of additional low-level pathology on cognition. In this study, of 670 donated post-mortem brains, we found that almost 70% of cases exhibited multimorbidity and only 22% were considered a pure diagnosis. Importantly, no case of Lewy Body dementia or vascular dementia was considered pure. A key finding is that the presence of low levels of additional pathology increased the likelihood of having mild dementia vs mild cognitive impairment by almost 20-fold, indicating low levels of additional pathology do impact the clinical progression of a distinct disease. Given the high prevalence and the potential clinical impact, cerebral multimorbidity should be at the forefront of consideration in dementia research.

SeminarNeuroscienceRecording

Covid And Cognition

Lucy Cheke
Department of Psychology, University of Cambridge
May 11, 2021

ONS figures suggest that at least 10% of individuals suffering COVID -19 Infection continue to experience several weeks after testing positive, and other studies report the proportions as even higher (e.g. Logue et al., 2021). One of the most prevalent reported symptoms among these “Long Covid” sufferers is cognitive dysfunction (Davis et al., 2020). However, to date the cognitive sequelae of COVID -19 are little understood. There are a number of reasons why COVID -19 infection might be associated with cognitive impairment and mental illness (e.g. Bougakov et al., 2020). In particular, increasing evidence indicates inflammation (e.g. Huang et al., 2020) and dysfunctional clotting (e.g. Taquet et al., 2021) as issues of major concern, both of which have been previously linked to a range of cognitive deficits (e.g. Vintimilla et al., 2019; Cumming et al., 2013). Indeed, evidence is beginning to emerge that cognitive issues may be widespread in the post-infection period, particularly among hospitalised and ventilated patients (e.g. Hampshire et al., 2020; Alemanno et al,. 2020). Here I shall present “Hot off the [SPSS]Press” results from a study on memory and cognition following COVID infection in a non-hospitalized cohort.

SeminarNeuroscience

From function to cognition: New spectroscopic tools for studying brain neurochemistry in-vivo

Assaf Tal
Weizmann Institute
Apr 22, 2021

In this seminar, I will present new methods in magnetic resonance spectroscopy (MRS) we’ve been working on in the lab. The talk will be divided into two parts. In the first, I will talk about neurochemical changes we observe in glutamate and GABA during various paradigms, including simple motors tasks and reinforcement learning. In the second part, I’ll present a new approach to MRS that focuses on measuring the relaxation times (T1, T2) of metabolites, which reflect changes to specific cellular microenvironments. I will explain why these can be exciting markers for studying several in-vivo pathologies, and also present some preliminary data from a cohort of mild cognitive impairment (MCI) patients, showing changes that correlate to cognitive decline.

SeminarNeuroscience

Mapping early brain network changes in neurodegenerative and cerebrovascular disorders: a longitudinal perspective

Helen Zhou
Center for Sleep & Cognition – Center for translational magnetic resonance research, University of Singapore
Jan 19, 2021

The spatial patterning of each neurodegenerative disease relates closely to a distinct structural and functional network in the human brain. This talk will mainly describe how brain network-sensitive neuroimaging methods such as resting-state fMRI and diffusion MRI can shed light on brain network dysfunctions associated with pathology and cognitive decline from preclinical to clinical dementia. I will first present our findings from two independent datasets on how amyloid and cerebrovascular pathology influence brain functional networks cross-sectionally and longitudinally in individuals with mild cognitive impairment and dementia. Evidence on longitudinal functional network organizational changes in healthy older adults and the influence of APOE genotype will be presented. In the second part, I will describe our work on how different pathology influences brain structural network and white matter microstructure. I will also touch on some new data on how brain network integrity contributes to behavior and disease progression using multivariate or machine learning approaches. These findings underscore the importance of studying selective brain network vulnerability instead of individual region and longitudinal design. Further developed with machine learning approaches, multimodal network-specific imaging signatures will help reveal disease mechanisms and facilitate early detection, prognosis and treatment search of neuropsychiatric disorders.

SeminarNeuroscienceRecording

Targeting the synapse in Alzheimer’s Disease

Johanna Jackson
UK Dementia Research Institute at Imperial College London
Dec 14, 2020

Alzheimer’s Disease is characterised by the accumulation of misfolded proteins, namely amyloid and tau, however it is synapse loss which leads to the cognitive impairments associated with the disease. Many studies have focussed on single time points to determine the effects of pathology on synapses however this does not inform on the plasticity of the synapses, that is how they behave in vivo as the pathology progresses. Here we used in vivo two-photon microscopy to assess the temporal dynamics of axonal boutons and dendritic spines in mouse models of tauopathy[1] (rTg4510) and amyloidopathy[2] (J20). This revealed that pre- and post-synaptic components are differentially affected in both AD models in response to pathology. In the Tg4510 model, differences in the stability and turnover of axonal boutons and dendritic spines immediately prior to neurite degeneration was revealed. Moreover, the dystrophic neurites could be partially rescued by transgene suppression. Understanding the imbalance in the response of pre- and post-synaptic components is crucial for drug discovery studies targeting the synapse in Alzheimer’s Disease. To investigate how sub-types of synapses are affected in human tissue, the Multi-‘omics Atlas Project, a UKDRI initiative to comprehensively map the pathology in human AD, will determine the synaptome changes using imaging and synaptic proteomics in human post mortem AD tissue. The use of multiple brain regions and multiple stages of disease will enable a pseudotemporal profile of pathology and the associated synapse alterations to be determined. These data will be compared to data from preclinical models to determine the functional implications of the human findings, to better inform preclinical drug discovery studies and to develop a therapeutic strategy to target synapses in Alzheimer’s Disease[3].

SeminarNeuroscienceRecording

Phospholipid regulation in cognitive impairment and vascular dementia

Gloria Patricia Cardona-Gómez
School of Medicine at University of Antioquia, Medellín, Colombia
Dec 14, 2020

An imbalance in lipid metabolism in neurodegeneration is still poorly understood. Phospholipids (PLs) have multifactorial participation in vascular dementia as Alzheimer, post-stroke dementia, CADASIL between others. Which include the hyperactivation of phospholipases, mitochondrial stress, peroxisomal dysfunction and irregular fatty acid composition triggering proinflammation in a very early stage of cognitive impairment. The reestablishment of physiological conditions of cholesterol, sphingolipids, phospholipids and others are an interesting therapeutic target to reduce the progression of AD. We propose the positive effect of BACE1 silencing produces a balance of phospholipid profile in desaturase enzymes-depending mode to reduce the inflammation response, and recover the cognitive function in an Alzheimer´s animal and brain stroke models. Pointing out there is a great need for new well-designed research focused in preventing phospholipids imbalance, and their consequent energy metabolism impairment, pro-inflammation and enzymatic over-processing, which would help to prevent unhealthy aging and AD progression.

SeminarNeuroscience

Multimodal brain imaging to predict progression of Alzheimer’s disease

Karl Herholz
University of Manchester, Division of Neuroscience and Experimental Psychology
Dec 7, 2020

Cross-sectional and longitudinal multimodal brain imaging studies using positron emission tomography (PET) and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) have provided detailed insight into the pathophysiological progression of Alzheimer’s disease. It starts at an asymptomatic stage with widespread gradual accumulation of beta-amyloid and spread of pathological tau deposits. Subsequently changes of functional connectivity and glucose metabolism associated with mild cognitive impairment and brain atrophy may develop. However, the rate of progression to a symptomatic stage and ultimately dementia varies considerably between individuals. Mathematical models have been developed to describe disease progression, which may be used to identify markers that determine the current stage and likely rate of progression. Both are very important to improve the efficacy of clinical trials. In this lecture, I will provide an overview on current research and future perspectives in this area.

SeminarNeuroscienceRecording

Affordable Robots/Computer Systems to Identify, Assess, and Treat Impairment After Brain Injury

Michelle Johnson
University of Pennsylvania, Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation and Department of BioEngineering
Oct 7, 2020

Non-traumatic brain injury due to stroke, cerebral palsy and HIV often result in serious long-term disability worldwide, affecting more than 150 million persons globally; with the majority of persons living in low and middle income countries. These diseases often result in varying levels of motor and cognitive impairment due to brain injury which then affects the person’s ability to complete activities of daily living and fully participate in society. Increasingly advanced technologies are being used to support identification, diagnosis, assessment, and therapy for patients with brain injury. Specifically, robot and mechatronic systems can provide patients, physicians and rehabilitation clinical providers with additional support to care for and improve the quality of life of children and adults with motor and cognitive impairment. This talk will provide a brief introduction to the area of rehabilitation robotics and, via case studies, illustrate how computer/technology-assisted rehabilitation systems can be developed and used to assess motor and cognitive impairment, detect early evidence of functional impairment, and augment therapy in high and low-resource settings.

ePosterNeuroscience

COGNITIVE IMPAIRMENT IN LONG COVID: NEUROBIOLOGICAL INSIGHTS FROM RESTING-STATE FMRI IN A LARGE-SCALE COHORT

Andrea Perrottelli, Silvana Galderisi, Mario Amore, Stefano Barlati, Gianmarco Cascino, Mario Cirillo, Daniele Corbo, Giorgio Di Lorenzo, Francesco Di Salle, Fabrizio Esposito, Roberto Gasparotti, Luigi Giuliani, Palmiero Monteleone, Gabriele Nibbio, Lorenzo Onorato, Antonio Vita, Mario Maj

FENS Forum 2026

ePosterNeuroscience

INTRANASAL LEMON-DERIVED NANOVESICLES AMELIORATE COGNITIVE IMPAIRMENT IN A HIGH-FAT DIET RAT MODEL OF METABOLIC SYNDROME: FOCUS ON MODULATORY HIPPOCAMPAL SIGNALING PATHWAYS

Nicolo' Ricciardi, Valentina Di Liberto, Miriana Scordino, Giulia Urone, Danila Di Majo, Giuseppe Giglia, Pierangelo Sardo, Giuseppe Ferraro, Riccardo Alessandro, Stefania Raimondo, Giuditta Gambino

FENS Forum 2026

ePosterNeuroscience

Analysis of soluble TREM2 levels in CSF and plasma of mild cognitive impairment and Alzheimer’s disease subjects

Ena Španić, Mirjana Babić Leko, Klara Brgić, Željka Vogrinc, Marina Boban, Fran Borovečki, Nataša Klepac, Goran Šimić
ePosterNeuroscience

Cognitive impairment in Dp(10)2Yey mouse model of Down syndrome is associated with altered neural dynamics and changes in medial prefrontal cortex and hippocampal cellular biology

Phillip Muza, Daniel Bush, Steven J. West, Marta Perez Gonzalez, Karen Cleverley, Suzanna Noy, Loukia Katsouri, Victor Tybulewicz, Mark Good, Matthew C. Walker, Elizabeth Fisher, Pishan Chang
ePosterNeuroscience

Cognitive impairment in mice with a gain-of-function mutation in retinoic acid receptor beta (RARB)

Devanshi Shah, Eve Racette, Marc Danik, Nicolas Lemmetti, Jacques L. Michaud
ePosterNeuroscience

Enhanced neuronal glycolysis causes cognitive impairment and metabolic syndrome in mouse

Daniel Jimenez-Blasco, Marina Garcia-Macia, Carlos Vicente-Gutierrez, Ruben Quintana-Cabrera, Jesus Agulla, Rebeca Lapresa, Veronica Bobo-Jimenez, Emilio Fernandez, Peter Carmeliet, Angeles Almeida, Juan P. Bolaños
ePosterNeuroscience

Extracellular vesicles from human iPSC-derived neural stem cells alleviate microglial response and cognitive impairments in a chronic neuroinflammation model

Gunel Ayyubova, Maheedhar Kodali, Raghavendra Upadhya, Madhu Leelavathi Nara Fnu, Sahithi Attaluri, Bing Shuai, Ashok Shetty
ePosterNeuroscience

GSK-3β inhibitor, VP3.15, restores cognitive impairment and neuronal compromise in a murine model of intraventricular hemorrhage of the preterm newborn

Isabel Atienza, Angel Del Marco, Isabel Benavente-Fernández, Antonio Segado-Arenas, Carmen Gil, Ana Martínez, Simon Lubian-Lopez, Monica Garcia-Alloza
ePosterNeuroscience

Investigating the mechanisms underlying the beneficial effects of exercise on cognitive impairment associated with schizophrenia - focus on parvalbumin interneurons and perineuronal nets

Jennifer A. Fletcher, John Gigg, Michael Harte
ePosterNeuroscience

Local Tau reduction rescues cognitive impairments and pathological phenotypes in a preclinical model of tauopathy

Carolina Facal, Javier A. Muñiz, A. Ezequiel Pereyra, Ramiro Clerici Delville, Mariano Soiza Reilly, Germán Falasco, Ana Damianich, Maria Elena Avale
ePosterNeuroscience

Lupus-associated cognitive impairment linked to systems–level dysfunctions in theta–gamma coupling and place cell dynamics in the CA1 field of the hippocampus

Tomás S. Huerta, Joshua J. Strohl, Patricio T. Huerta
ePosterNeuroscience

EEG microstate topographies discriminate subjective cognitive decline and mild cognitive impairment

Michael Lassi, Alberto A. Vergani, Alberto Mazzoni
ePosterNeuroscience

MiRNAs networks mediate a compensatory response in heart failure induced cognitive impairment

Verena Gisa, Md. Rezaul Islam, Dawid Lbik, Raoul M. Hofmann, Tonatiuh Pena, Dennis Krüger, Susanne Burkhardt, Anna-Lena Schütz, Farahnaz Sananbenesi, Karl Toischer, Andre Fischer
ePosterNeuroscience

Myelin alteration and cognitive impairment

Océane Mercier, Pascale Quilichini, Myriam Cayre, Pascale Durbec
ePosterNeuroscience

Preclinical mouse study on maternal separation impacting childhood chemotherapy-induced cognitive impairment

Livine Craeghs, Zsuzsanna Callaerts-Vegh, Rudi D'Hooge
ePosterNeuroscience

Predictive and construct validity in a mouse model of chemotherapy-induced cognitive impairment

Victoria Aurora Ossorio-Salazar, Zsuzsanna Callaerts-Vegh, Rudi D'Hooge
ePosterNeuroscience

Role of TRPA1 in LPS-induced anxiety-like behaviors and cognitive impairments in mice

Seon-Kyung Kim, Kwang-Hyun Hur, Jae-Gyeong Lee, Seok-Yong Lee, Choon-Gon Jang
ePosterNeuroscience

Сellular immunity in patients with concussion and possible association with subsequent cognitive impairment withdrawn by author

Anna Norka, Sergey Vorobjev, Raisa Kuznetsova, Igor Kudryavtsev, Maria Serebriakova, Sergey Kovalenko, Dmitry Monashenko, Anatoly Saveliev
ePosterNeuroscience

Single-cell RNA sequencing reveals senescent-like neurons in the injured mouse brain and treatment with senolytic drug ABT263 improves injury-induced cognitive impairment: is there therapeutic potential?

Nicole Schwab, Daria Taskina, Youngjun Ju, Lili-Naz Hazrati
ePosterNeuroscience

Ubiquinol supplementation improves gender-dependent cerebral vasoreactivity and ameliorates chronic inflammation and endothelial dysfunction associated with mild cognitive impairment

Sonia García-Carpintero, Javier D. Bértalo, Cristina Pedrero-Prieto, Javier Frontiñán-Rubio, Mariano A. Salas, Mario Durán-Prado, Eloy G. Pérez, Julia Vaamonde, Francisco Javier Alcaín
ePosterNeuroscience

Uncovering the signaling pathways to cognitive impairments and neurodegeneration in Down syndrome by cell profiling of the locus coeruleus in trisomic mice

Marta Fructuoso, Ammara Mohammad, Riwan Brillet, David Akbar, Justine Guegan, Laura Xicota, Marie-Claude Potier
ePosterNeuroscience

Yoga alleviates cognitive impairment and cardiac autonomic dysfunction in breast cancer patients receiving chemotherapy: a randomized controlled study

Inbaraj Ganagarajan, Sathyaprabha T N, Kaviraja Udupa, Raghavendra Rao M, Jamuna Rajeswaran, Amritanshu Ram, Krishna Nandakumar, Spoorthi M, Shekar Patil, Govind Babu
ePosterNeuroscience

Neurovascular dysfunction and cognitive impairment in a model of heart failure with preserved ejection fraction

Sara Lambrichts, Laura Van der Taelen, Daria Majcher, Denise Hermes, Nicole Bitsch, Elizabeth Jones, Jos Prickaerts, Robert J. Van Oostenbrugge, Sébastien Foulquier

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Have a seminar, talk, or paper on Cognitive Impairment? Post it so others working in this area can find it.

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