Figure 1

Elevated tau levels in plasma from patients with Alzheimer's disease (AD). (a) Plasma levels of tau are elevated in patients with AD compared with cognitively normal controls and patients with mild cognitive impairment (MCI). (b) MCI patients who developed AD (MCI-AD) during follow-up had baseline tau levels similar to those of patients with stable MCI (SMCI). (c) There was no correlation between tau levels in plasma and cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) in any diagnostic group. Thin horizontal lines in panels (a) and (b) indicate medians. A nonparametric Kruskal-Wallis test followed by Mann-Whitney was performed to test for statistical significance. Spearman's rank correlation coefficient was used to assess the relationship between plasma and CSF tau concentrations in panel (c), where open circles, gray squares, and black triangles represent AD, MCI, and controls, respectively.