Person:
Bruña Fernández, Ricardo

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First Name
Ricardo
Last Name
Bruña Fernández
Affiliation
Universidad Complutense de Madrid
Faculty / Institute
Medicina
Department
Radiología, Rehabilitación y Fisioterapia
Area
Radiología y Medicina Física
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Search Results

Now showing 1 - 7 of 7
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    Searching for Primary Predictors of Conversion from Mild Cognitive Impairment to Alzheimer’s Disease: A Multivariate Follow-Up Study
    (Journal of Alzheimer's Disease, 2016) López García, María Eugenia; Turrero Nogués, Agustín; Cuesta Prieto, Pablo; López Sanz, David; Bruña Fernández, Ricardo; Marcos Dolado, Alberto; Gil Gregorio, Pedro; Yus, Miguel; Barabash Bustelo, Ana; Cabranes Díaz, José Antonio; Maestu Unturbe, Fernando; Fernández Lucas, Alberto Amable
    Recent proposals of diagnostic criteria within the healthy aging-Alzheimer’s disease (AD) continuum stressed the role of biomarker information. More importantly, such information might be critical to predict those mild cognitive impairment (MCI) patients at a higher risk of conversion to AD. Usually, follow-up studies utilize a reduced number of potential markers although the conversion phenomenon may be deemed as multifactorial in essence. In addition, not only biological but also cognitive markers may play an important role. Considering this background, we investigated the role of cognitive reserve, cognitive performance in neuropsychological testing, hippocampal volumes, APOE genotype, and magnetoencephalography power sources to predict the conversion to AD in a sample of 33 MCI patients. MCIs were followed up during a 2-year period and divided into two subgroups according to their outcome: The “stable” MCI group (sMCI, 21 subjects) and the “progressive” MCI group (pMCI, 12 subjects). Baseline multifactorial information was submitted to a hierarchical logistic regression analysis to build a predictive model of conversion to AD. Results indicated that the combination of left hippocampal volume, occipital cortex theta power, and clock drawing copy subtest scores predicted conversion to AD with a 100% of sensitivity and 94.7% of specificity. According to these results it might be suggested that anatomical, cognitive, and neurophysiological markers may be considered as “first order” predictors of progression to AD, while APOE or cognitive reserve proxies might play a more secondary role.
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    BDNF Val66Met polymorphism and gamma band disruption in resting state brain functional connectivity: A magnetoencephalography study in cognitively intact older females
    (Frontiers in Neuroscience, 2018) Rodríguez Rojo, Inmaculada Concepción; Cuesta Prieto, Pablo; López García, María Eugenia; De Frutos Lucas, Jaisalmer; Bruña Fernández, Ricardo; Pereda de Pablo, Ernesto; Barabash Bustelo, Ana; Montejo, Pedro; Montenegro Peña, María Mercedes; Marcos Dolado, Alberto; López-Higes, Ramón; Fernández Lucas, Alberto Amable; Maestu Unturbe, Fernando
    The pathophysiological processes undermining brain functioning decades before the onset of the clinical symptoms associated with dementia are still not well understood. Several heritability studies have reported that the Brain Derived Neurotrophic Factor (BDNF) Val66Met genetic polymorphism could contribute to the acceleration of cognitive decline in aging. This mutation may affect brain functional connectivity (FC), especially in those who are carriers of the BDNF Met allele. The aim of this work was to explore the influence of the BDNF Val66Met polymorphism in whole brain eyes-closed, resting-state magnetoencephalography (MEG) FC in a sample of 36 cognitively intact (CI) older females. All of them were ε3ε3 homozygotes for the apolipoprotein E (APOE) gene and were divided into two subgroups according to the presence of the Met allele: Val/Met group (n = 16) and Val/Val group (n = 20). They did not differ in age, years of education, Mini-Mental State Examination scores, or normalized hippocampal volumes. Our results showed reduced antero-posterior gamma band FC within the Val/Met genetic risk group, which may be caused by a GABAergic network impairment. Despite the lack of cognitive decline, these results might suggest a selective brain network vulnerability due to the carriage of the BDNF Met allele, which is linked to a potential progression to dementia. This neurophysiological signature, as tracked with MEG FC, indicates that age-related brain functioning changes could be mediated by the influence of particular genetic risk factors.
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    Sex Differences in the Complexity of Healthy Older Adults’ Magnetoencephalograms
    (Entropy, 2019) Shumbayawonda, Elizabeth; Abásolo, Daniel; López Sanz, David; Bruña Fernández, Ricardo; Maestú Unturbe, Fernando; Fernández Lucas, Alberto Amable
    The analysis of resting-state brain activity recording in magnetoencephalograms (MEGs) with new algorithms of symbolic dynamics analysis could help obtain a deeper insight into the functioning of the brain and identify potential differences between males and females. Permutation Lempel-Ziv complexity (PLZC), a recently introduced non-linear signal processing algorithm based on symbolic dynamics, was used to evaluate the complexity of MEG signals in source space. PLZC was estimated in a broad band of frequencies (2–45 Hz), as well as in narrow bands (i.e., theta (4–8 Hz), alpha (8–12 Hz), low beta (12–20 Hz), high beta (20–30 Hz), and gamma (30–45 Hz)) in a sample of 98 healthy elderly subjects (49 males, 49 female) aged 65–80 (average age of 72.71 ± 4.22 for males and 72.67 ± 4.21 for females). PLZC was significantly higher for females than males in the high beta band at posterior brain regions including the precuneus, and the parietal and occipital cortices. Further statistical analyses showed that higher complexity values over highly overlapping regions than the ones mentioned above were associated with larger hippocampal volumes only in females. These results suggest that sex differences in healthy aging can be identified from the analysis of magnetoencephalograms with novel signal processing methods.
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    Brain signal complexity in adults with Down syndrome: Potential application in the detection of mild cognitive impairment
    (Frontiers in Aging Neuroscience, 2022) Fernández Lucas, Alberto Amable; Ramírez Toraño, Federico; Bruña Fernández, Ricardo; Zuluaga Arias, María Del Pilar; Esteba Castillo, Susanna; Abásolo, Daniel; Moldenhauer, Fernando; Shumbayawonda, Elizabeth; Maestu Unturbe, Fernando; García Alba, Javier
    Background: Down syndrome (DS) is considered the most frequent cause of early-onset Alzheimer’s disease (AD), and the typical pathophysiological signs are present in almost all individuals with DS by the age of 40. Despite of this evidence, the investigation on the pre-dementia stages in DS is scarce. In the present study we analyzed the complexity of brain oscillatory patterns and neuropsychological performance for the characterization of mild cognitive impairment (MCI) in DS. Materials and methods: Lempel-Ziv complexity (LZC) values from restingstatemagnetoencephalography recordings and the neuropsychological performance in 28 patients with DS [control DS group (CN-DS) (n = 14), MCI group (MCI-DS) (n = 14)] and 14 individuals with typical neurodevelopment (CN-no-DS) were analyzed. Results: Lempel-Ziv complexity was lowest in the frontal region within the MCI-DS group, while the CN-DS group showed reduced values in parietal areas when compared with the CN-no-DS group. Also, the CN-no-DS group exhibited the expected pattern of significant increase of LZC as a function of age, while MCI-DS cases showed a decrease. The combination of reduced LZC values and a divergent trajectory of complexity evolution with age, allowed the discrimination of CN-DS vs. MCI-DS patients with a 92.9% of sensitivity and 85.7% of specificity. Finally, a pattern of mnestic and praxic impairment was significantly associated in MCI-DS cases with the significant reduction of LZC values in frontal and parietal regions (p = 0.01). Conclusion: Brain signal complexity measured with LZC is reduced in DS and its development with age is also disrupted. The combination of both features might assist in the detection of MCI within this population.
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    Complexity changes in preclinical Alzheimer’s disease: An MEG study of subjective cognitive decline and mild cognitive impairment
    (Clinical Neurophysiology, 2020) Shumbayawonda, Elizabeth; López Sanz, David; Bruña Fernández, Ricardo; Serrano Martínez, Noelia; Fernández Lucas, Alberto Amable; Maestu Unturbe, Fernando; Abásolo, Daniel
    Objective To analyse magnetoencephalogram (MEG) signals with Lempel-Ziv Complexity (LZC) to identify the regions of the brain showing changes related to cognitive decline and Alzheimeŕs Disease (AD). Methods LZC was used to study MEG signals in the source space from 99 participants (36 male, 63 female, average age: 71.82 ± 4.06) in three groups (33 subjects per group): healthy (control) older adults, older adults with subjective cognitive decline (SCD), and adults with mild cognitive impairment (MCI). Analyses were performed in broadband (2–45 Hz) and in classic narrow bands (theta (4–8 Hz), alpha (8–12 Hz), low beta (12–20 Hz), high beta (20–30 Hz), and, gamma (30–45 Hz)). Results LZC was significantly lower in subjects with MCI than in those with SCD. Moreover, subjects with MCI had significantly lower MEG complexity than controls and SCD subjects in the beta frequency band. Lower complexity was correlated with smaller hippocampal volumes. Conclusions Brain complexity – measured with LZC – decreases in MCI patients when compared to SCD and healthy controls. This decrease is associated with a decrease in hippocampal volume, a key feature in AD progression. Significance This is the first study to date characterising the changes of brain activity complexity showing the specific spatial pattern of the alterations as well as the morphological correlations throughout preclinical stages of AD.
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    Influence of the APOE ε4 allele and mild cognitive impairment diagnosis in the disruption of the MEG resting state functional connectivity in sources space
    (Journal of Alzheimer's Disease, 2015) Cuesta Prieto, Pablo; Garcés, Pilar; Castellanos, Nazareth P; López García, María Eugenia; Aurtenetxe, Sara; Bajo, Ricardo; Pineda-Pardo, José Angel; Bruña Fernández, Ricardo; Marín, Antonio García; Delgado Losada, María Luisa; Barabash Bustelo, Ana; Ancín, Inés; Cabranes Díaz, José Antonio; Fernández Lucas, Alberto Amable; del Pozo, Francisco; Sancho Ruiz, Miguel; Marcos Dolado, Alberto; Nakamura, Akinori; Maestu Unturbe, Fernando
    The apolipoprotein E (APOE) ε4 allele constitutes the major genetic risk for the development of late onset Alzheimer's disease (AD). However, its influence on the neurodegeneration that occurs in early AD remains unresolved. In this study, the resting state magnetoencephalography(MEG) recordings were obtained from 27 aged healthy controls and 36 mild cognitive impairment (MCI) patients. All participants were divided into carriers and non-carriers of the ε4 allele. We have calculated the functional connectivity (FC) in the source space along brain regions estimated using the Harvard-Oxford atlas and in the classical bands. Then, a two way ANOVA analysis (diagnosis and APOE) was performed in each frequency band. The diagnosis effect consisted of a diminished FC within the high frequency bands in the MCI patients, affecting medial temporal and parietal regions. The APOE effect produced a decreased long range FC in delta band in ε4 carriers. Finally, the interaction effect showed that the FC pattern of the right frontal-temporal region could be reflecting a compensatory/disruption process within the ε4 allele carriers. Several of these results correlated with cognitive decline and neuropsychological performance. The present study characterizes how the APOE ε4 allele and MCI status affect the brain's functional organization by analyzing the FC patterns in MEG resting state in the sources space. Therefore a combination of genetic, neuropsychological, and neurophysiological information might help to detect MCI patients at higher risk of conversion to AD and asymptomatic subjects at higher risk of developing a manifest cognitive deterioration.
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    Neuropsychological and neurophysiological characterization of mild cognitive impairment and Alzheimer's disease in Down syndrome
    (Neurobiology of Aging, 2019) García Alba, Javier; Ramírez Toraño, Federico; Esteba Castillo, Susanna; Bruña Fernández, Ricardo; Moldenhauer, Fernando; Novell, Ramón; Romero Medina, Verónica; Maestu Unturbe, Fernando; Fernández Lucas, Alberto Amable
    Down syndrome (DS) has been considered a unique model for the investigation of Alzheimer’s disease AD) but intermediate stages in the continuum are poorly defined. Considering this, we investigated the neurophysiological (i.e., magnetoencephalography [MEG]) and neuropsychological patterns of mild cognitive impairment (MCI) and AD in middle-aged adults with DS. The sample was composed of four groups: Control-DS (n ¼ 14, mean age 44.64 3.30 years), MCI-DS (n ¼ 14, 51.64 3.95 years), AD-DS (n ¼ 13, 53.54 6.58 years), and Control-no-DS (healthy controls, n ¼ 14, 45.21 4.39 years). DS individuals were studied with neuropsychological tests and MEG, whereas the Control-no-DS group completed only the MEG session. Our results showed that the AD-DS group exhibited a significantly poorer performance as compared with the Control-DS group in all tests. Furthermore, this effect was crucially evident in AD-DS individuals when compared with the MCI-DS group in verbal and working memory abilities. In the neurophysiological domain, the Control-DS group showed a widespread increase of theta activity when compared with the Control-no-DS group. With disease progression, this increased theta was substituted by an augmented delta, accompanied with a reduction of alpha activity. Such spectral patterndspecifically observed in occipital, posterior temporal, cuneus, and precuneus regionsdcorrelated with the performance in cognitive tests. This is the first MEG study in the field incorporating both neuropsychological and neurophysiological information, and demonstrating that this combination of markers is sensitive enough to characterize different stages along the AD continuum in DS.