CenTauR: Toward a universal scale and masks for standardizing tau imaging studies

Victor L Villemagne; Antoine Leuzy; Sandra Sanabria Bohorquez; Santiago Bullich; Hitoshi Shimada; Christopher C Rowe; Pierrick Bourgeat; Brian Lopresti; Kun Huang; Natasha Krishnadas; Jurgen Fripp; Yuhei Takado; Alexandra Gogola; Davneet Minhas; Robby Weimer; Makoto Higuchi; Andrew Stephens; Oskar Hansson; Vincent Doré; Alzheimer's Disease Neuroimaging Initiative and the AIBL research group

doi:10.1002/dad2.12454

CenTauR: Toward a universal scale and masks for standardizing tau imaging studies

Alzheimers Dement (Amst). 2023 Jul 7;15(3):e12454. doi: 10.1002/dad2.12454. eCollection 2023 Jul-Sep.

Authors

Victor L Villemagne^{1

2}, Antoine Leuzy³, Sandra Sanabria Bohorquez⁴, Santiago Bullich⁵, Hitoshi Shimada^{6

7}, Christopher C Rowe^{2

8

9}, Pierrick Bourgeat¹⁰, Brian Lopresti¹¹, Kun Huang², Natasha Krishnadas^{2

12}, Jurgen Fripp¹⁰, Yuhei Takado⁶, Alexandra Gogola¹¹, Davneet Minhas¹¹, Robby Weimer⁴, Makoto Higuchi⁶, Andrew Stephens⁵, Oskar Hansson^{3

13}, Vincent Doré^{2

14}; Alzheimer's Disease Neuroimaging Initiative and the AIBL research group

Affiliations

¹ Department of Psychiatry University of Pittsburgh Pittsburgh Pennsylvania USA.
² Department of Molecular Imaging & Therapy Austin Health Melbourne Victoria Australia.
³ Clinical Memory Research Unit Department of Clinical Sciences Lund University Malmö Sweden.
⁴ Genentech Inc. South San Francisco California USA.
⁵ Life Molecular Imaging GmbH Berlin Germany.
⁶ Department of Functional Brain Imaging National Institutes for Quantum and Radiological Science and Technology Chiba Japan.
⁷ Brain Research Institute Niigata University Niigata Japan.
⁸ Florey Department of Neurosciences & Mental Health The University of Melbourne Melbourne Parkville Australia.
⁹ The Australian Dementia Network (ADNeT) Melbourne Victoria Australia.
¹⁰ Health and Biosecurity Flagship The Australian eHealth Research Centre CSIRO Brisbane Queensland Australia.
¹¹ Department of Radiology University of Pittsburgh Pittsburgh Pennsylvania USA.
¹² Florey Institute of Neurosciences & Mental Health Parkville Victoria Australia.
¹³ Memory Clinic Skåne University Hospital Malmö Sweden.
¹⁴ Health and Biosecurity Flagship The Australian eHealth Research Centre CSIRO Heidelberg Victoria Australia.

Abstract

Introduction: Recently, an increasing number of tau tracers have become available. There is a need to standardize quantitative tau measures across tracers, supporting a universal scale. We developed several cortical tau masks and applied them to generate a tau imaging universal scale.

Method: One thousand forty-five participants underwent tau scans with either ¹⁸F-flortaucipir, ¹⁸F-MK6240, ¹⁸F-PI2620, ¹⁸F-PM-PBB3, ¹⁸F-GTP1, or ¹⁸F-RO948. The universal mask was generated from cognitively unimpaired amyloid beta (Aβ)- subjects and Alzheimer's disease (AD) patients with Aβ+. Four additional regional cortical masks were defined within the constraints of the universal mask. A universal scale, the CenTauR_z, was constructed.

Results: None of the regions known to display off-target signal were included in the masks. The CenTauR_z allows robust discrimination between low and high levels of tau deposits.

Discussion: We constructed several tau-specific cortical masks for the AD continuum and a universal standard scale designed to capture the location and degree of abnormality that can be applied across tracers and across centers. The masks are freely available at https://www.gaain.org/centaur-project.