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BACKGROUND: Rates of cognitive decline in Alzheimer's disease (AD) are extremely heterogeneous, with symptom onset occurring between ages 40-100 years and conversion from mild cognitive impairment (MCI) to AD dementia occurring in 2-20 years. Biomarkers for amyloid-beta (Aβ) and tau proteins, the hallmark AD pathologies, have improved diagnosis and drug development but explain only 20-40% of the variance in AD-related cognitive impairment (CI).

METHOD: To discover additional biomarkers of CI in AD, we perform cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) proteomics on 3,397 individuals from six major prospective AD case-control cohorts. Synapse proteins emerge as the strongest correlates of CI, independent of Aβ and tau.

RESULT: Using machine learning, we derive the CSF YWHAG:NPTX2 synapse protein ratio, which explains 27% of the variance in CI beyond CSF PTau181:Aβ42, 10% beyond tau PET, and 28% beyond CSF NfL, GAP43, and Ng in Aβ- and phosphorylated tau- positive (A+T+) individuals. We find YWHAG:NPTX2 also increases with normal aging and at a faster rate in APOE4 carriers and autosomal dominant-AD mutation carriers. For prognosis, we define YWHAG:NPTX2 thresholds to stratify A+T+ individuals into five groups that track with future cognitive resilience versus decline. Most notably, among A+T+ MCI individuals, those in the predicted cognitively normal group have a 73% reduced risk of cognitive decline, while those in the predicted dementia group have a 2.3 times increased risk, after adjusting for CSF PTau181:Aβ42, CSF NfL, CSF Ng, CSF GAP43, age, APOE4, and sex. Lastly, we develop a plasma proteomic signature of CI, which we evaluate in 13,401 samples, that partly recapitulates CSF YWHAG:NPTX2.

CONCLUSION: Overall, our findings underscore CSF YWHAG:NPTX2 and the corresponding plasma signature as robust prognostic biomarkers for AD onset and progression beyond gold-standard biomarkers of Aβ, tau, and neurodegeneration and implicate synapse dysfunction as a core driver of AD dementia.