“Vascular contributions to cognitive impairment are increasingly
recognized as shown by neuropathological, neuroimaging, and
cerebrospinal fluid biomarker studies.”
“Moreover, small vessel
disease of the brain has been estimated to contribute to approximately
50% of all dementias worldwide, including those caused by Alzheimer’s
disease”.
“Vascular changes in Alzheimer’s disease have been typically attributed to the vasoactive and/or vasculotoxic effects of amyloid-β, and more recently tau.”
“….studies suggest that amyloid-β and tau lead to blood vessel
abnormalities and blood–brain barrier breakdown…..neurovascular
dysfunction and blood–brain barrier breakdown develop early in
Alzheimer’s disease…”
.
“To address this question, we studied
brain capillary damage using a novel cerebrospinal fluid biomarker of
blood–brain barrier-associated capillary mural cell pericyte, soluble
platelet-derived growth factor receptor-β, and regional blood–brain
barrier permeability using dynamic contrast-enhanced magnetic resonance
imaging.”
.
“Our data show that individuals with early cognitive
dysfunction develop brain capillary damage and blood–brain barrier
breakdown in the hippocampus irrespective of Alzheimer’s amyloid-β
and/or tau biomarker changes, suggesting that blood–brain barrier
breakdown is an early biomarker of human cognitive dysfunction
independent of amyloid-β and tau.”
.
D.A.Nation, et al
Blood–brain barrier breakdown is an early biomarker of human cognitive dysfunction
Nature Medicine — Volume 25 #2 — February 2019 — page 270