New York: Mayo Clinic researchers have identified specific DNA-level changes in the brains of people with Alzheimer's disease (AD).
Using advanced biological analysis, the team mapped alterations in the brain's regulatory landscape that may help explain why Alzheimer's presents and progresses differently from person to person. The findings, published in Nature Communications, could also open new avenues for understanding other neurodegenerative diseases.
"While our study findings are impactful by themselves, we did not want to stop there and sought to make both our data and results available to the research community in a way that also protects donor identities," says Nilufer Ertekin-Taner, chair of Neuroscience at Mayo Clinic, a physician-scientist and senior author of the study.
"We wanted to do this because relatively few groups have the expertise to analyze such big data and derive biological insights."
The Mayo research team studied brain tissue from the Mayo Clinic Department of Neuroscience Brain Bank, examining brain tissue from 472 people with AD, and analyzed patterns of DNA methylation — a type of chemical "tag" on DNA — across the genome.
While this work will continue to shape research, its impact extends beyond Mayo Clinic and will provide a valuable resource for scientists worldwide.
