[ 18 F]RO948 Tau PET in early and late onset Alzheimer's disease: associations with plasma p-tau 217…

Cohort studyEuropean journal of nuclear medicine and molecular imaging· Jun 2026

[ 18 F]RO948 Tau PET in early and late onset Alzheimer's disease: associations with plasma p-tau 217, atrophy and cognition.

Mariola Zapater-Fajari, Marco Bucci, Konstantinos Chiotis … Agneta Nordberg

Neurologic ImagingCohort studyQ1IF 5.8

Tau PET tracked memory-region tau tightly with plasma p-tau217 levels

[ 18 F]RO948 Tau PET in early and late onset Alzheimer's disease: associations with plasma p-tau 217, atrophy and cognition.

Mariola Zapater-Fajari … Agneta Nordberg

European journal of nuclear medicine and molecular imaging · Jun 2026 · Q1 in Radiology

Purpose

The aim of this study was to compare regional brain tau extent across the disease spectrum in early- and late-onset Alzheimer's disease using the second-generation tau PET tracer [ 18 F]RO948, and to investigate the relationship between PET-derived patterns, plasma p-tau217, brain atrophy, and cognition.

Methods

We examined 57 participants: 39 patients from the Cognitive Assessment Unit at Karolinska University Hospital (Stockholm/Sweden)-diagnosed as MCI Aβ- (n = 10), MCI Aβ + (n = 16; 8 EO and 6 LO), and AD (n = 13; 5 EOAD and 8 LOAD)-and 18 cognitively normal controls.

n = 57 participants

rho = 0.81

Results

rho = 0.81

Higher plasma p-tau217 strongly correlated with higher tau PET binding in memory regions.

n = 57 participants

More results

Both EO and LO MCI (Aß +) showed higher [ 18 F]RO948 binding in amygdala, entorhinal cortex, hippocampus (p < 0.001) and extending to inferior temporal regions (p < 0.01) compared to controls, with some MCI-EO cases already showing advanced neocortical tau burden.

More results

At the AD stage, EOAD patients showed greater neocortical tau extent in temporo-parietal and frontal cortices than LOAD.

The Tau‑PET/p-tau217 association was different between EOAD and LOAD with greater differences in parietal cortices.

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Conclusion · 1 of 3

[ 18 F]RO948-PET captured interindividual heterogeneity in tau accumulation that was not reflected by plasma p-tau217.

Conclusion · 2 of 3

This dissociation was particularly evident in neocortical regions, where LOAD showed elevated plasma p-tau217 levels despite low tau PET binding.

Conclusion · 3 of 3

These findings highlight the value of tau-PET as a sensitive biomarker for detecting early disease heterogeneity, assessing disease severity, and improving patient stratification for disease-modifying treatments.

[ 18 F]RO948 Tau PET in early and late onset Alzheimer's disease: associations with plasma p-tau 217, atrophy and cognition.

[ 18 F]RO948 Tau PET in early and late onset Alzheimer's disease: associations with plasma p-tau 217, atrophy and cognition.

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