Distinct CSF biomarker-associated DNA methylation in Alzheimer’s disease and cognitively normal subjects

BACKGROUND: Growing evidence has demonstrated that DNA methylation (DNAm) plays an important role in Alzheimer’s disease (AD) and that DNAm differences can be detected in the blood of AD subjects. Most studies have correlated blood DNAm with the clinical diagnosis of AD in living individuals. However, as the pathophysiological process of AD can begin many years before the onset of clinical symptoms, there is often disagreement between neuropathology in the brain and clinical phenotypes. Therefore, blood DNAm associated with AD neuropathology, rather than with clinical data, would provide more relevant information on AD pathogenesis. METHODS: We performed a comprehensive analysis to identify blood DNAm associated with cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) pathological biomarkers for AD. Our study included matched samples of whole blood DNA methylation, CSF Aβ(42), phosphorylated tau(181) (pTau(181)), and total tau (tTau) biomarkers data, measured on the same subjects and at the same clinical visits from a total of 202 subjects (123 CN or cognitively normal, 79 AD) in the Alzheimer’s Disease Neuroimaging Initiative (ADNI) cohort. To validate our findings, we also examined the association between premortem blood DNAm and postmortem brain neuropathology measured on a group of 69 subjects in the London dataset. RESULTS: We identified a number of novel associations between blood DNAm and CSF biomarkers, demonstrating that changes in pathological processes in the CSF are reflected in the blood epigenome. Overall, the CSF biomarker-associated DNAm is relatively distinct in CN and AD subjects, highlighting the importance of analyzing omics data measured on cognitively normal subjects (which includes preclinical AD subjects) to identify diagnostic biomarkers, and considering disease stages in the development and testing of AD treatment strategies. Moreover, our analysis revealed biological processes associated with early brain impairment relevant to AD are marked by DNAm in the blood, and blood DNAm at several CpGs in the DMR on HOXA5 gene are associated with pTau(181) in the CSF, as well as tau-pathology and DNAm in the brain, nominating DNAm at this locus as a promising candidate AD biomarker. CONCLUSIONS: Our study provides a valuable resource for future mechanistic and biomarker studies of DNAm in AD. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s13195-023-01216-7.