Day 3 at AD/PD 2025 brought powerful insights into sex-specific mechanisms in Alzheimer’s disease, an area where keen insights matter more than ever. It’s well-established that women are nearly twice as likely to develop Alzheimer’s by age 60, and now the field is beginning to unravel the molecular drivers behind this disparity. 

New findings revealed that female ApoE4 carriers experience heightened neutrophil degradation and microglial activation through the inflammatory cytokine IL-17F. Promisingly, inhibition of IL-17F not only dampened this neuroinflammatory cascade but also led to measurable improvements in cognition and therapeutic response. 

These discoveries highlight the growing importance of ultra-sensitive tools, like those developed by Quanterix, to detect nuanced biomarker shifts in diverse populations. With technologies like Simoa enabling detection of inflammation, neuronal injury, and immune signaling at femtomolar levels, we’re not just observing disease, we’re decoding it. As we advance toward personalized neurology, understanding sex-specific pathways will be essential for tailoring effective diagnostics and interventions. 

We also welcomed Olivia Belbin from Sant Pau Memory Unit and Sant Pau Research Institute, Barcelona, Spain into our booth for a presentation on the Evaluation of cerebrospinal fluid levels of VAMP-2 and SNAP-25 in a dementia with Lewy bodies clinical cohort stratified by Alzheimer’s pathophysiological biomarkers for our first talk of the day.  

Nick Ashton, PhD, from Banner Sun Health Research Institute joined for lunch to discuss P-tau217, NfL and GFAP in capillary blood for the detection of Alzheimer’s disease pathology: The DROP-AD project. This is related to our new dried blood spot extraction kit that was launched recently. 

Our last in-booth presentation today was by Anna Mammel from Neurocode where she discussed ALZpath p-tau217 in Alzheimer’s disease and healthy aging. 

As we wrap another fantastic day, we’re gearing up for tomorrow’s great line up of speakers. You still have time to see us at booth #22. So check out our in-booth schedule and come on by.