SynthesisProgress in neuro-psychopharmacology & biological psychiatry2017
Alpha-7 nicotinic agonists for cognitive deficits in neuropsychiatric disorders: A translational meta-analysis of rodent and human studies.
Synthesis in Progress in neuro-psychopharmacology & biological psychiatry, 2017. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 44 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
44 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 76 citations in OpenAlex.
- Cognitive Enhancers in Schizophrenia: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis of Alpha-7 Nicotinic Acetylcholine Receptor Agonists for Cognitive Deficits and Negative Symptoms.Frontiers in psychiatry · 2021Pooled it
- Varenicline for cognitive impairment in people with schizophrenia: systematic review and meta-analysis.Psychopharmacology · 2020Pooled it
- An α7 nAChR approach for the baseline-dependent modulation of deviance detection in schizophrenia: A pilot study assessing the combined effect of CDP-choline and galantamine.Journal of psychopharmacology (Oxford, England) · 2023Trial
- CDP-choline and galantamine, a personalized α7 nicotinic acetylcholine receptor targeted treatment for the modulation of speech MMN indexed deviance detection in healthy volunteers: a pilot study.Psychopharmacology · 2020Trial
- Double blind, two dose, randomized, placebo-controlled, cross-over clinical trial of the positive allosteric modulator at the alpha7 nicotinic cholinergic receptor AVL-3288 in schizophrenia patients.Neuropsychopharmacology : official publication of the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology · 2020Trial
- Transdermal Nicotine for the Treatment of Mood and Cognitive Symptoms in Nonsmokers With Late-Life Depression.The Journal of clinical psychiatry · 2018Trial
- Astrocytes mediate the pro-cognitive value of α7nAChRs and of α7nAChR-targeting therapeutics.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2026Article
- Investigation of varenicline and tropisetron in latent inhibition and novel object recognition in mice.Scientific reports · 2026Article
- Competitive Antagonism of Xylazine on α7 Nicotinic Acetylcholine Receptors and Reversal by Curcuminoids.ACS chemical neuroscience · 2025Article
- Cellular Mechanisms of Cognitive Enhancement: TheASN neuro · 2024Article
- Characterizing the binding of TC-5619 and encenicline on the alpha7 nicotinic acetylcholine receptor using PET imaging in the pig.Frontiers in neuroimaging · 2024Article
- The controversial effect of smoking and nicotine in SARS-CoV-2 infection.Allergy, asthma, and clinical immunology : official journal of the Canadian Society of Allergy and Clinical Immunology · 2023Review
- Neuropharmacological Potential of Diterpenoid Alkaloids.Pharmaceuticals (Basel, Switzerland) · 2023Review
- Human-specific duplicate CHRFAM7A gene is associated with more severe osteoarthritis and amplifies pain behaviours.Annals of the rheumatic diseases · 2023Article
- The future of psychopharmacology: a critical appraisal of ongoing phase 2/3 trials, and of some current trends aiming to de-risk trial programmes of novel agents.World psychiatry : official journal of the World Psychiatric Association (WPA) · 2023Article
- European Psychiatric Association guidance on treatment of cognitive impairment in schizophrenia.European psychiatry : the journal of the Association of European Psychiatrists · 2022Review
- Progress and Pitfalls in Developing Agents to Treat Neurocognitive Deficits Associated with Schizophrenia.CNS drugs · 2022Review
- Review
- The Basal Forebrain Cholinergic Nuclei and Their Relevance to Schizophrenia and Other Psychotic Disorders.Frontiers in psychiatry · 2022Review
- Central Activation of Alpha7 Nicotinic Signaling Attenuates LPS-Induced Neuroinflammation and Sickness Behavior in Adult but Not in Aged Animals.Molecules (Basel, Switzerland) · 2021Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
3 authors at 1 institution in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
Cognitive dysfunction in schizophrenia (SCZ) and Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a major driver of functional disability but is largely unresponsive to current therapeutics. Animal models of cognitive dysfunction relevant to both disorders suggest the α7 nicotinic acetylcholine receptor (nAChR) may be a promising drug development target, with multiple clinical trials subsequently testing this hypothesis in individuals with SCZ and AD. However, the translational value of rodent cognitive tasks for predicting the overall efficacy of this therapeutic target in clinical trials is unknown. To compare effect sizes between rodent and human studies, we searched PubMed and the Cochrane Library for all randomized, placebo-controlled trials of compounds with pharmacological activity at the α7 nAChR for treatment of cognitive dysfunction in SCZ and AD and identified 18 studies comprising 2670 subjects treated with eight different compounds acting as full or partial agonists. Cognitive outcomes were standardized, and random-effects meta-analyses revealed no statistically significant effects of α7 nAChR agonists on overall cognition or any of eight cognitive subdomains when all doses were included (Range of all cognitive outcomes: Cohen's d=-0.077 to 0.12, negative favoring drug). In contrast, analysis of 29 rodent studies testing the same α7 agonists revealed large effect sizes in multiple commonly used preclinical behavioral tests of cognition (Range: d=-1.18 to - 0.73). Our results suggest that targeting the α7 nAChR with agonists is not a robust treatment for cognitive dysfunction in SCZ or AD and necessitate a better understanding of the translational gap for therapeutics targeting the α7 nAChR.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.