Highlights Frontal functional connectivity (FC) alterations in ALS emerge over six months. The frontal FC alterations over time are related to executive dysfunction in ALS. The middle frontal gyrus is a key area for the frontoparietal breakdown in ALS. This study offers new potential markers for monitoring altered FC in ALS over time.

The purpose of the present review is to provide an update of the available recent scientific literature on the use of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) in Alzheimer’s disease (AD). MRI is playing an increasingly important role in the characterization of the AD signatures, which can be useful in both the diagnostic process and monitoring of disease progression. Furthermore, this technique is unique in assessing brain structure and function and provides a deep understanding of in vivo evolution of cerebral pathology. In the reviewing process, we established a priori criteria and we thoroughly searched the very recent scientific literature (January 2018–March 2020) for relevant articles on this topic. In summary, we selected 73 articles out of 1654 publications retrieved from PubMed. Based on this selection, this review summarizes the recent application of MRI in clinical trials, defining the predementia stages of AD, the clinical utility of MRI, proposal of novel biomarkers and brain regions of interest, and assessing the relationship between MRI and cognitive features, risk and protective factors of AD. Finally, the value of a multiparametric approach in clinical and preclinical stages of AD is discussed.

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Background Nonverbal communication is a crucial aspect of interpersonal relationships, and defective emotion recognition can lead to altered social interactions. The aim of our study was to investigate the relationship between emotion processing and resting‐state functional connectivity (RS‐FC) in frontotemporal lobar degeneration (FTLD). Method 80 FTLD patients and 65 age‐matched healthy controls underwent brain 3.0 Tesla MRI [3DT1‐weighted and RS‐functional MRI (RS‐fMRI)] and neuropsychological assessment, including the Comprehensive Affect Testing System (CATS). FLAME models in FSL were performed between each emotion construct and RS‐FC changes within crucial networks. Result FTLD patients performed worse than controls in all CATS‐subtests. In controls, a high performance at the emotion naming and emotion matching constructs was related with increased RS‐FC within the cerebellar network, and a high performance at the emotion discrimination construct was related with increased RS‐FC of the right occipital face area (OFA) within the visuo‐associative network. In FTLD patients, high performances at the emotion naming construct were related with increased RS‐FC of the bilateral OFA within the visuo‐associative network and the bilateral frontal pole within the default‐mode‐network, whereas high performances at the emotion matching construct were related with increased RS‐FC of the left OFA within the visuo‐associative network. Finally, in FTLD patients, high performances at each emotional construct were related with decreased RS‐FC within the basal ganglia network. Conclusion In healthy controls and FTLD patients, the RS‐FC within crucial networks is related to different constructs of emotion processing. In FTLD, the RS‐FC associated with emotional performances involved a large number of brain regions, likely due to brain functional specificity loss and compensatory attempts. These findings offer potential markers for detecting functional vulnerability linked to social interactions. Disclosures. Supported by the Italian Ministry of Health (GR‐2013‐02357415); European Research Council (StG‐2016_714388_NeuroTRACK).

This study investigated the relationship between emotion processing and resting-state functional connectivity (rs-FC) of the brain networks in frontotemporal lobar degeneration (FTLD). Eighty FTLD patients (including cases with behavioral variant of frontotemporal dementia, primary progressive aphasia, progressive supranuclear palsy syndrome, motor neuron disease) and 65 healthy controls underwent rs-functional MRI. Emotion processing was tested using the Comprehensive Affect Testing System (CATS). In patients and controls, correlations were investigated between each emotion construct and rs-FC changes within critical networks. Mean rs-FC of the clusters significantly associated with CATS scoring were compared among FTLD groups. FTLD patients had pathological CATS scores compared with controls. In controls, increased rs-FC of the cerebellar and visuo-associative networks correlated with better scores in emotion-matching and discrimination tasks, respectively; while decreased rs-FC of the visuo-spatial network was related with better performance in the affect-matching and naming. In FTLD, the associations between rs-FC and CATS scores involved more brain regions, such as orbitofrontal and middle frontal gyri within anterior networks (i.e., salience and default-mode), parietal and somatosensory regions within visuo-spatial and sensorimotor networks, caudate and thalamus within basal-ganglia network. Rs-FC changes associated with CATS were similar among all FTLD groups. In FTLD compared to controls, the pattern of rs-FC associated with emotional processing involves a larger number of brain regions, likely due to functional specificity loss and compensatory attempts. These associations were similar across all FTLD groups, suggesting a common physiopathological mechanism of emotion processing breakdown, regardless the clinical presentation and pattern of atrophy.

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