ArticleNPJ Parkinson's disease2026
Pedunculopontine-thalamic cholinergic projections in rapid eye movement sleep behaviour disorder.
Article in NPJ Parkinson's disease, 2026. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Not yet cited in PubMed.
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
0 citing papers in PubMed.
No citing paper in PubMed yet.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
4 authors.
Funding
Abstract
Cholinergic system degeneration is a hallmark of Lewy body disease, including Parkinson's disease (PD) and dementia with Lewy bodies (DLB), but its involvement in prodromal stages, particularly regarding pedunculopontine-thalamic projections, remains unclear. This study investigated cholinergic pathway integrity in isolated REM sleep behaviour disorder (iRBD) and its relation to phenoconversion risk. We analyzed data from 146 iRBD patients and 102 controls from the Parkinson's Progression Markers Initiative using T1-weighted MRI for basal forebrain volume and diffusion-weighted imaging for three cholinergic pathways: lateral and medial nucleus basalis of Meynert (NBM)-cortical pathways and pedunculopontine nucleus (PPN)-thalamic pathways. Bayesian mixed models and Cox proportional hazards models assessed group differences, cognitive associations, and phenoconversion risk. Fractional anisotropy along PPN-thalamic pathways was reduced in iRBD, particularly in the left hemisphere. Within iRBD patients, medial NBM pathway integrity correlated with baseline cognitive performance. Reduced PPN-thalamic integrity predicted increased phenoconversion risk (hazard ratio=2.08). No group differences or associations with phenoconversion were found for NBM-cortical pathways or basal forebrain volume. These findings suggest that brainstem-thalamic cholinergic projections may be affected earlier than the basal forebrain system in Lewy body disease, potentially serving as a sensitive marker for phenoconversion risk in iRBD pending validation in longer follow-up studies.
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.