# Sleep metrics from machine learning for Alzheimer's disease diagnostics

> **NIH NIH R21** · UNIVERSITY OF MASSACHUSETTS LOWELL · 2020 · $256,922

## Abstract

PROJECT SUMMARY
This proposal is responsive to NIH solicitation PA-17-089 for projects involving secondary analysis of pre-existing
geriatric datasets. While presently there is no cure for Alzheimer’s disease, existing literature indicates that early
diagnosis in the preclinical stage, i.e., before the onset of clinical symptoms, will be key to treatments. There is
a pressing need for noninvasive predictors of cognitive decline that can enable early identification of individuals
at Alzheimer’s disease risk. A mounting body of scientific evidence suggests that sleep disturbances (including
microarchitectural disruptions to non-rapid-eye-motion sleep and decline in sleep quality) might be the earliest
observable symptoms of Alzheimer’s disease. On-the-go sleep and activity monitoring could address the need
for noninvasive indicators of cognitive decline in subjects who are in the (asymptomatic or mildly symptomatic)
preclinical stage of Alzheimer’s disease. Here, we will build on preliminary results that reveal a set of sleep
features derived from polysomnography (PSG) that are predictive of cognitive performance. We are proposing
to perform secondary analysis of sleep and cognition data from the Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis (MESA)
cohort using state-of-the-art deep learning tools to enable sleep-based prediction of cognitive impairment for
early detection of Alzheimer’s disease. While PSG is the gold standard for sleep measurement, it is not well-
suited for routine, day-to-day use. In comparison, wrist-based measurements (e.g. actigraphy, heart rate, ECG,
and pulse oximetry) obtained from wearable devices allow “on-the-go” sleep monitoring. The combination of
these on-the-go measures with the latest artificial intelligence tools is a feasible route to early Alzheimer’s
diagnostics. We will use attention-guided long short-term memory autoencoders to identify overt and latent
characteristics of the raw time-series datasets, which will allow us to more effectively mine the rich MESA data
resource. Our deep learning framework will also take into account sociodemographic variables, indicators of
health status, and medications. To ensure scientific rigor, secondary validation of the MESA-trained deep
learning models will be performed on PSG and actigraphy data from the Harvard Aging Brain Study, which is a
longitudinal study designed to further our understanding of what differentiates normal aging from preclinical
Alzheimer’s disease. To address any concern about the “black-box” nature of deep learning models, we will
compare the learned feature set with sleep microarchitectural features previously computed using classical
statistical techniques. Previous data suggests that a subject’s apolipoprotein ε4 (ApoE4) allele carrier status
influences the degree to which their sleep patterns impact their cognitive abilities. We will verify this by
incorporating ApoE4 status as an additional input to the deep learning model. Literature shows that over ...

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10042952
- **Project number:** 1R21AG068890-01
- **Recipient organization:** UNIVERSITY OF MASSACHUSETTS LOWELL
- **Principal Investigator:** Joyita Dutta
- **Activity code:** R21 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2020
- **Award amount:** $256,922
- **Award type:** 1
- **Project period:** 2020-08-01 → 2022-04-30

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10042952

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10042952, Sleep metrics from machine learning for Alzheimer's disease diagnostics (1R21AG068890-01). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-23 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10042952. Licensed CC0.

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