ArticleAlzheimer's research & therapy2021
Herpesvirus infections and Alzheimer's disease: a Mendelian randomization study.
Article in Alzheimer's research & therapy, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 43 papers, 3 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
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Who cites it
43 citing papers in PubMed, 3 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 87 citations in OpenAlex.
- Evaluating the Bidirectional Causal Effects of Alzheimer's Disease Across Multiple Conditions: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis of Mendelian Randomization Studies.International journal of molecular sciences · 2025Pooled it
- Association between herpes zoster and Parkinson's disease and dementia: a systematic review and meta-analysis.Frontiers in neurology · 2024Pooled it
- Mendelian randomization reveals no correlations between herpesvirus infection and idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis.PloS one · 2023Pooled it
- Recent Insights into the Role of Herpesviridae in Alzheimer's Disease: A Structured Narrative Review Based on a Systematic Literature Search.Neurology international · 2026Review
- Disease-disease interactions: molecular links of neurodegenerative diseases with cancer, viral infections, and type 2 diabetes.Translational neurodegeneration · 2025Review
- Early antiviral treatment following gammaherpesvirus-68 infection of the central nervous system prevents subsequent multiple sclerosis-like disease.Journal of neuroinflammation · 2025Article
- Article
- Human herpes viruses are associated with steeper age-dependent increases of serum biomarkers for dementia in cognitively unimpaired women.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- Peripheral and central neuroimmune mechanisms in Alzheimer's disease pathogenesis.Molecular neurodegeneration · 2025Review
- Risk of Developing Alzheimer Disease in Relation to Common Infections.Neuro-degenerative diseases · 2025Article
- Auto-Immune Glial Fibrillary Acidic Protein Astrocytopathy with Active Intrathecal Epstein-Barr Virus: A Single-Center Case Series Report.Neuropsychiatric disease and treatment · 2025Article
- New insights on the link between Epstein‑Barr virus infection and cognitive decline in neurodegenerative diseases (Review).Experimental and therapeutic medicine · 2024Review
- From Viral Infections to Alzheimer's Disease: Unveiling the Mechanistic Links Through Systems Bioinformatics.The Journal of infectious diseases · 2024Article
- From a focal skin issue to a systemic disease: the multifaceted nature of cold sores, novel findings.Virusdisease · 2024Article
- Integrative Multi-omics Analysis to Characterize Herpes Virus Infection Increases the Risk of Alzheimer's Disease.Molecular neurobiology · 2024Article
- The gut-facial aging axis: A two-sample Mendelian randomization and mediation analysis of gut microbiota, gut microbiota metabolic pathways, and blood metabolites.Skin research and technology : official journal of International Society for Bioengineering and the Skin (ISBS) [and] International Society for Digital Imaging of Skin (ISDIS) [and] International Society for Skin Imaging (ISSI) · 2024Article
- Age, sex and Alzheimer's disease: a longitudinal study of 3xTg-AD mice reveals sex-specific disease trajectories and inflammatory responses mirrored in postmortem brains from Alzheimer's patients.Alzheimer's research & therapy · 2024Article
- The necroptosis cell death pathway drives neurodegeneration in Alzheimer's disease.Acta neuropathologica · 2024Review
- Exploring the Pathophysiology of Long COVID: The Central Role of Low-Grade Inflammation and Multisystem Involvement.International journal of molecular sciences · 2024Review
- Associations of infections and vaccines with Alzheimer's disease point to a role of compromised immunity rather than specific pathogen in AD.Experimental gerontology · 2024Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
10 authors at 3 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
backgroundObservational studies have suggested that herpesvirus infection increased the risk of Alzheimer's disease (AD), but it is unclear whether the association is causal. The aim of the present study is to evaluate the causal relationship between four herpesvirus infections and AD.
methodsWe performed a two-sample Mendelian randomization analysis to investigate association of four active herpesvirus infections with AD using summary statistics from genome-wide association studies. The four herpesvirus infections (i.e., chickenpox, shingles, cold sores, mononucleosis) are caused by varicella-zoster virus, herpes simplex virus type 1, and Epstein-Barr virus (EBV), respectively. A large summary statistics data from International Genomics of Alzheimer's Project was used in primary analysis, including 21,982 AD cases and 41,944 controls. Validation was further performed using family history of AD data from UK Biobank (27,696 cases of maternal AD, 14,338 cases of paternal AD and 272,244 controls).
resultsWe found evidence of a significant association between mononucleosis (caused by EBV) and risk of AD after false discovery rates (FDR) correction (odds ratio [OR] = 1.634, 95% confidence interval [CI] = 1.092-2.446, P = 0.017, FDR-corrected P = 0.034). It has been verified in validation analysis that mononucleosis is also associated with family history of AD (OR [95% CI] = 1.392 [1.061, 1.826], P = 0.017). Genetically predicted shingles were associated with AD risk (OR [95% CI] = 0.867 [0.784, 0.958], P = 0.005, FDR-corrected P = 0.020), while genetically predicted chickenpox was suggestively associated with increased family history of AD (OR [95% CI] = 1.147 [1.007, 1.307], P = 0.039).
conclusionsOur findings provided evidence supporting a positive relationship between mononucleosis and AD, indicating a causal link between EBV infection and AD. Further elucidations of this association and underlying mechanisms are likely to identify feasible interventions to promote AD prevention.
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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.