Neurology | April 7, 2021

Rojas JC, Wang P, Staffaroni AM, Heller C, Cobigo Y, Wolf A, Goh SM, Ljubenkov PA, Heuer HW, Fong JC, Taylor JB, Veras E, Song L, Jeromin A, Hanlon D, Yu L, Khinikar A, Sivasankaran R, Kieloch A, Valentin MA, Karydas AM, Mitic LL, Pearlman R, Kornak J, Kramer JH, Miller BL, Kantarci K, Knopman DS, Graff-Radford N, Petrucelli L, Rademakers R, Irwin DJ, Grossman M, Ramos EM, Coppola G, Mendez MF, Bordelon Y, Dickerson BC, Ghoshal N, Huey ED, Mackenzie IR, Appleby BS, Domoto-Reilly K, Hsiung GR, Toga AW, Weintraub S, Kaufer DI, Kerwin D, Litvan I, Onyike CU, Pantelyat A, Roberson ED, Tartaglia MC, Foroud T, Chen W, Czerkowicz J, Graham DL, van Swieten JC, Borroni B, Sanchez-Valle R, Moreno F, Laforce R, Graff C, Synofzik M, Galimberti D, Rowe JB, Masellis M, Finger E, Vandenberghe R, de Mendonça A, Tagliavini F, Santana I, Ducharme S, Butler CR, Gerhard A, Levin J, Danek A, Otto M, Sorbi S, Cash DM, Convery RS, Bocchetta M, Foiani M, Caroline VG, Peakman G, Russell L, Swift I, Todd E, Rohrer JD, Boeve BF, Rosen HJ and Boxer AL

Neurology. 2021

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1212/WNL.0000000000011848

Abstract

Objective: We tested the hypothesis that plasma neurofilament light chain (NfL) identifies asymptomatic carriers of familial frontotemporal lobar degeneration (FTLD)-causing mutations at risk of disease progression.

Methods: Baseline plasma NfL concentrations were measured with Simoa in original (n = 277) and validation (n = 297) cohorts. C9orf72, GRN and MAPT mutation carriers and non-carriers from the same families were classified by disease severity [asymptomatic, prodromal and full phenotype] using the CDR^® Dementia Staging Instrument plus behavior and language domains from the National Alzheimer’s Disease Coordinating Center FTLD module (CDR^®+NACC-FTLD). Linear mixed effect models related NfL to clinical variables.

Results: In both cohorts, baseline NfL was higher in asymptomatic mutation carriers who showed phenoconversion or disease progression compared to non-progressors (original: 11.4 ± 7 pg/mL vs. 6.7 ± 5 pg/mL, p = 0.002; validation: 14.1 ± 12 pg/mL vs. 8.7 ± 6 pg/mL, p = 0.035). Plasma NfL discriminated symptomatic from asymptomatic mutation carriers or prodromal disease (original cutoff: 13.6 pg/mL, 87.5% sensitivity, 82.7% specificity; validation cutoff: 19.8 pg/mL, 87.4% sensitivity, 84.3% specificity). Higher baseline NfL correlated with worse longitudinal CDR^®+NACC-FTLD sum of boxes scores, neuropsychological function and atrophy, regardless of genotype or disease severity, including asymptomatic mutation carriers.

Conclusions: Plasma NfL identifies asymptomatic carriers of FTLD-causing mutations at short-term risk of disease progression, and is a potential tool to select participants for prevention clinical trials.

This study was performed using the Quanterix HD-1 Analyzer.