Taken together, the study’s findings represent a crucial step forward in addressing many unresolved issues regarding Long COVID. The systemic increase in AMPARs provides a direct biological explanation for the cognitive symptoms, highlighting a target for potential treatments. For example, drugs that suppress AMPAR activity could be a viable approach to mitigate brain fog. Interestingly, the team’s analysis also demonstrated that imaging data can be used to distinguish patients from healthy controls with 100% sensitivity and 91% specificity.
this post was submitted on 02 Oct 2025
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It's unclear if these findings are for Long COVID related brain fog only, or if the other kinds, like the brain fog reported by ME/CFS patients, that fall under this result.
It's great that strides are made in research for this.
My kid has a lot of similar symptoms to Long COVID (including brain fog) that are attributed to Dysautonomia but all got significantly worse after getting COVID. This has apparently been common for some Dysautonomia patients. I’ll be really curious to see if this leads to improved treatment.
They'll probably solve every instance of Long Covid but health insurance will deny trying those findings on ME patients.
As explained in their paper, published in Brain Communications on October 1, 2025, the team hypothesized that patients with brain fog might exhibit disrupted expression of AMPA receptors (AMPARs)—key molecules for memory and learning—based on prior research into psychiatric and neurological disorders such as depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, and dementia. Thus, they used a novel method called [^11^C]K-2 AMPAR PET imaging to directly visualize and quantify the density of AMPARs in the living human brain.
By comparing imaging data from 30 patients with Long COVID to 80 healthy individuals, the researchers found a notable and widespread increase in the density of AMPARs across the brains of patients. This elevated receptor density was directly correlated with the severity of their cognitive impairment, suggesting a clear link between these molecular changes and the symptoms. Additionally, the concentrations of various inflammatory markers were also correlated with AMPAR levels, indicating a possible interaction between inflammation and receptor expression.
more than four years after the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic...
Uhh, hmmm.... I mean, technically true I guess.
Lol thats probably when they started drafting the paper.
It's also been more than 4 years since the onset of the Spanish Flu pandemic.
More than 4 years since the Black Plague.
More than 4 years since the first Ice Age
Nice, hopefully someone will come up with a treatment for symptoms or (fingers crossed) a way to reverse the effects.
There has been research showing improvement from certain antihistamines. Better treatments are needed though.
Antihistamines? That makes it sound like an autoimmune thing?
There was a study showing specific T-Cells attacking mitochondria instead of viruses.
Can't wait for MAHA to ban that too
This makes me wonder how can one tell that the brain fog is from COVID and not increasing amount of daily stress factors, malnutrition etc etc
Apparently, the type of PET scan used in the paper would be able to do it with a high success rate. Though throwing everyone in a scanner would be an expensive solution.
interesting, I guess brain fog signals are different when the underlying causes are different? should read the article I think