Tau imaging in the study of ageing, Alzheimer's disease, and other neurodegenerative conditions

•A deeper insight into tau deposition in primary and secondary tauopathies.•Cross-sectional and longitudinal assessment of the patterns of tau deposition.•A better understanding of the role tau plays in ageing and neurodegeneration.•Earlier and accurate diagnosis, as well as prognosis of disease progression.•To be used as a surrogate marker for disease-specific therapeutic trials.

In vivo tau imaging allows a deeper understanding of tau deposition in the brain, providing insights into the causes, diagnosis and treatment of primary and secondary tauopathies such as Alzheimer's disease, progressive supranuclear palsy, corticobasal syndrome, chronic traumatic encephalopathy, and some variants of frontotemporal lobar degeneration. The cross-sectional and longitudinal assessment of the temporal and spatial patterns of tau deposition in the brain will allow a better understanding of the role tau plays in ageing as well as its relationship with cognition, genotype, and neurodegeneration. It is likely that selective tau imaging could be used as a diagnostic and prognostic biomarker of disease progression, as well as a surrogate marker for monitoring of efficacy and patient recruitment for disease-specific therapeutic trials.

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