Sep 8, 2026
Web-based study tracks motor and memory tasks from home devices
Written by Marisa Horak, MS | Sept. 2, 2026
- Parkinson's disease is a neurological disorder causing motor and nonmotor symptoms.
- Traditional in-person clinical evaluations present challenges, prompting the need for remote assessment solutions.
- Scientists have compiled a large data set to train and test AI for objective, remote Parkinson's diagnosis.
A team of U.S. scientists has compiled a large data set of remotely collected data from people with and without Parkinson’s disease, which the scientists hope will serve as an important tool for developing strategies to diagnose the disorder remotely using artificial intelligence (AI).
“By pairing task-derived behavioral features with device type and handedness metadata, this dataset provides a benchmark resource for evaluating AI robustness, subgroup performance, and generalizability in remote [Parkinson’s disease] assessment,” the scientists wrote in “RobustPDx: A Structured Web-Based Parkinson’s Assessment Dataset and Benchmark for AI Robustness to Device Type and Handedness,” which was published in Scientific Data.
In-person assessment poses logistical hurdles
Parkinson’s is a neurological disorder that causes motor symptoms such as slowness and tremor, as well as nonmotor symptoms that can range from memory problems to digestive complaints.
Assessments conducted by a clinical expert are currently the gold standard for diagnosing Parkinson’s and tracking the disease’s severity. But conducting an in-person assessment poses notable logistical hurdles, especially for people who don’t live near specialty centers, and the reliance on a human evaluator makes the assessments inherently subjective.
As it’s become more common for people to have computers and smart devices at home, scientists are increasingly exploring whether these devices could be used to monitor Parkinson’s remotely, offering greater convenience and objectivity.
AI is a broad field of computational analysis that uses large amounts of data and advanced algorithms to identify patterns. For AI tools to be effective, they need to be trained and tested on large, well-defined data sets.
Sep 7, 2026
Clinical assessments beat brain scans for forecasting long-term trajectory
Written by Marisa Horak, MS | Aug. 25, 2026
- Brain imaging data do not improve computer models used to predict long-term Parkinson’s disease progression.
- Incorporating MRI scans and machine learning models sometimes reduced the accuracy of motor symptom predictions.
- A small set of baseline clinical assessments remains the most effective way to forecast long-term cognitive and motor trajectories.
Brain imaging data are not very useful for computer models predicting the long-term trajectory of Parkinson’s disease, a study showed.
Researchers found that computer models aimed at predicting Parkinson’s progression were not meaningfully better when imaging data were included. In fact, some models became less accurate when imaging data were added.
The findings suggest that the best way to predict long-term Parkinson’s trajectories is with a small set of clinical assessments, the researchers said.
The study, “Baseline clinical features outperform structural MRI in predicting rapid cognitive and motor decline in Parkinson’s disease,” was published in npj Parkinson’s Disease.
Parkinson’s is a neurological disease that causes both motor and nonmotor symptoms. The disease is progressive, meaning these symptoms tend to worsen over time. But Parkinson’s doesn’t progress at the same rate for everyone, and there isn’t a reliable way to predict which patients will experience faster disease progression.
Sep 4, 2026
New research links disease's digestive problems to reduced nerve cell activity
Written by Marisa Horak, MS | Aug. 25, 2026
- Digestive problems in Parkinson's are linked to decreased nerve cell activity in the brain, new research in animals suggests.
- Electrified acupuncture applied at a specific point below the knee was shown to restore nerve cell activity and ease gut issues in mouse models.
- More preclinical studies are needed to move this strategy toward testing in people with Parkinson's, the researchers noted.
Digestive problems in Parkinson’s disease may be explained by the reduced activity of a specific type of nerve cells, called cholinergic neurons, in a particular brain region that helps regulate unconscious body functions, including digestion, a new study using a mouse model suggests.
The scientists say diminished activity of these neurons in that brain region, called the dorsal motor nucleus of the vagus, may slow the movement of food through the body, known as gut motility.
But new research in the animal models suggests that electroacupuncture — a type of acupuncture in which an electric charge is delivered through the needle — can restore the normal activity of these nerve cells and improve gut motility. In the mice, the electroacupuncture was applied at a specific point just below the knee.
“These findings highlight a circuit-specific mechanism and a promising neuromodulatory strategy for treating this debilitating gut symptom of [Parkinson’s],” the researchers wrote.
Still, more preclinical studies are needed before this treatment can be tested in people with the neurodegenerative disease, the team noted.
The study, “Impaired brain-gut circuit for gut motility dysfunction in mouse models of Parkinson’s disease,” was published in the journal Cell Reports.
In all humans, the digestive system is surrounded by muscles that help to push food through it. People with Parkinson’s, however, often experience gut dysmotility, where the movement of food through the digestive tract is slowed. This can result in problems such as constipation, which is a common nonmotor symptom of the disease.
Sep 2, 2026
Researchers find fewer friendly microbes in patients carrying the GBA1 mutation
Written by Marisa Horak, MS | Aug. 26, 2026
- Parkinson's disease patients with GBA1 gene mutations tend to have distinct shifts in the gut microbiome, with fewer protective microbes and more inflammation-promoting bacteria.
- Mutation carriers exhibit reduced anti-inflammatory butyrate-producing bacteria alongside elevated levels of microbes linked to gut inflammation.
- Further validation studies are needed to better understand the gut-microbiota-brain axis and its impact on Parkinson's progression.
People with Parkinson’s disease who carry mutations in the GBA1 gene tend to have higher levels of inflammation-promoting gut bacteria and fewer protective microbes than patients without the mutation, according to a new study.
While the overall diversity of gut bacteria remained similar between both groups, researchers uncovered key differences in specific bacterial strains that could influence how the disease progresses.
“This study suggests a subtle shift toward a more pro-inflammatory gut microbial profile in [Parkinson’s patients carrying GBA1 mutations], characterized by fewer butyrate-producing and more pro-inflammatory bacteria,” researchers noted.
The study, “Pathogenic GBA1 Variants and their Interaction with the Gut-Microbiota-Brain Axis in Parkinson’s Disease,” was published in Movement Disorders.
Genetics and the gut microbiome
The causes of Parkinson’s disease are not fully understood, but genetics is thought to play a role in determining disease risk. Mutations in the GBA1 gene are a well-established risk factor for Parkinson’s, and they can also cause a separate disorder called Gaucher disease.
The human digestive tract is home to billions of bacteria and other microscopic organisms, collectively known as the gut microbiome. A growing body of evidence suggests that the gut microbiome is dysregulated in Parkinson’s disease and may play a role in its development. However, much about the microbiome and its role in Parkinson’s remains unclear.
In the study, a team of U.S. scientists sought to determine whether the microbiome is altered in people with Parkinson’s who carry a mutation in the GBA1 gene. To find out, they conducted detailed analyses of stool samples from 36 patients: 16 with a GBA1 mutation and 20 without known Parkinson’s risk mutations.
Analyses showed that the gut microbiome’s overall diversity and community composition were comparable in Parkinson’s patients with or without GBA1 mutations. However, the researchers noted “subtle but potentially biologically relevant … differences.”
Sep 1, 2026
News Medical Life Sciences - The University of Oulu - Aug 26 2026
A new study from the University of Oulu suggests that gut bacteria may send different biological signals in Parkinson’s disease. The findings add to growing evidence that changes in the gut could be linked to Parkinson’s disease and may eventually help researchers identify new underlying mechanisms for the condition.
Rather than looking only at which bacteria are present in the gut, the researchers focused on the biological messages they send. Gut bacteria release extracellular vesicles, tiny particles that carry proteins and other molecules and can travel between cells, likely extending the microbial signaling beyond the gut.
The study, published in iScience, found that people with Parkinson’s disease had more of these vesicles in their stool samples than healthy individuals. The vesicles were also larger on average and carried a different mix of bacterial proteins, suggesting that microbial communication may be altered in the disease.
Microbiome research has traditionally focused on which bacteria are present and how their relative abundance changes. Our findings suggest that we should also ask what these bacteria are sending out into the body.”
Anatoliy Samoylenko, Senior Research Fellow at the University of Oulu and author of the study
The researchers analyzed faecal samples from 20 people with Parkinson’s disease and 19 healthy controls. They isolated extracellular vesicles produced by the gut microbiota and characterized them using nanoparticle tracking analysis, electron microscopy, 16S rRNA sequencing and mass spectrometry-based proteomics.
The analyses revealed differences between the Parkinson’s disease and control groups at several levels. Both the gut microbiota itself and the vesicles it produced showed distinct bacterial compositions. The vesicles from people with Parkinson’s disease also carried a different set of proteins.
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