Jessica de Leon, MD

Assistant Adjunct Professor
Memory and Aging Center

I am a behavioral neurologist with expertise in the evaluation and diagnosis of patients with primary progressive aphasia (PPA), frontotemporal dementia (FTD), and Alzheimer’s dementia. My research program aims to understand how bilingualism, language typology, and sociocultural factors affect the clinical, neuropsychological, and neuroimaging findings in neurodegenerative diseases. The underlying goal of my work is to improve dementia diagnosis in communities of different language and sociocultural backgrounds.

Publications: 

Perceptual and semantic deficits in face recognition in semantic dementia.

Neuropsychologia

Yadollahikhales G, Mandelli ML, Ezzes Z, Pillai J, Ratnasiri B, Baquirin DP, Miller Z, DeLeon J, Tee BL, Seeley W, Rosen H, Miller B, Kramer J, Sturm V, Gorno-Tempini ML, Montembeault M

Digital language markers distinguish frontal from right anterior temporal lobe atrophy in frontotemporal dementia.

medRxiv : the preprint server for health sciences

Vonk JMJ, Morin BT, Pillai J, Rolon DR, Bogley R, Baquirin DP, Ezzes Z, Tee BL, DeLeon J, Wauters L, Lukic S, Montembeault M, Younes K, Miller Z, García AM, Mandelli ML, Sturm VE, Miller BL, Gorno-Tempini ML

Clinical dimensions along the non-fluent variant primary progressive aphasia spectrum.

Brain : a journal of neurology

Illán-Gala I, Lorca-Puls DL, Tee BL, Ezzes Z, de Leon J, Miller ZA, Rubio-Guerra S, Santos-Santos M, Gómez-Andrés D, Grinberg LT, Spina S, Kramer JH, Wauters LD, Henry ML, Boxer AL, Rosen HJ, Miller BL, Seeley WW, Mandelli ML, Gorno-Tempini ML

Discriminating nonfluent/agrammatic and logopenic PPA variants with automatically extracted morphosyntactic measures from connected speech.

Cortex; a journal devoted to the study of the nervous system and behavior

Lukic S, Fan Z, García AM, Welch AE, Ratnasiri BM, Wilson SM, Henry ML, Vonk J, Deleon J, Miller BL, Miller Z, Mandelli ML, Gorno-Tempini ML

Speech and language markers of neurodegeneration: a call for global equity.

Brain : a journal of neurology

García AM, de Leon J, Tee BL, Blasi DE, Gorno-Tempini ML

Assessing processing speed and its neural correlates in the three variants of primary progressive aphasia with a non-verbal tablet-based task.

Cortex; a journal devoted to the study of the nervous system and behavior

Gajardo-Vidal A, Montembeault M, Lorca-Puls DL, Licata AE, Bogley R, Erlhoff S, Ratnasiri B, Ezzes Z, Battistella G, Tsoy E, Pereira CW, DeLeon J, Tee BL, Henry ML, Miller ZA, Rankin KP, Mandelli ML, Possin KL, Gorno-Tempini ML

The development of the Cognitive Assessment for Tagalog Speakers (CATS): A culturally and linguistically tailored test battery for Filipino Americans.

Alzheimer's & dementia (New York, N. Y.)

de Leon J, Bondoc I, Mamuyac E, Posecion L, Europa E, Kintanar LC, Roco N, Lamoca M, Escueta DP, Park VMT

Network anatomy in logopenic variant of primary progressive aphasia.

Human brain mapping

Mandelli ML, Lorca-Puls DL, Lukic S, Montembeault M, Gajardo-Vidal A, Licata A, Scheffler A, Battistella G, Grasso SM, Bogley R, Ratnasiri BM, La Joie R, Mundada NS, Europa E, Rabinovici G, Miller BL, De Leon J, Henry ML, Miller Z, Gorno-Tempini ML

Gaps in clinical research in frontotemporal dementia: A call for diversity and disparities-focused research.

Alzheimer's & dementia : the journal of the Alzheimer's Association

Franzen S, Nuytemans K, Bourdage R, Caramelli P, Ellajosyula R, Finger E, Illán-Gala I, Loi SM, Morhardt D, Pijnenburg Y, Rascovsky K, Williams MM, Yokoyama JS, Alladi S, Ayhan Y, Broce I, Castro-Suarez S, Coleman K, de Souza LC, Dacks PA, de Boer SCM, de Leon J, Dodge S, Grasso S, Gupta V, Gupta V, Ghoshal N, Kamath V, Kumfor F, Matias-Guiu JA, Narme P, Nielsen TR, Okhuevbie D, Piña-Escudero SD, Garcia RR, Scarioni M, Slachevsky A, Suarez-Gonzalez A, Tee BL, Tsoy E, Ulugut H, Babulal GM, Onyike CU, ISTAART FTD PIA and ISTAART Diversity and Disparities PIA

Network anatomy in logopenic variant of primary progressive aphasia.

medRxiv : the preprint server for health sciences

Mandelli ML, Lorca-Puls DL, Lukic S, Montembeault M, Gajardo-Vidal A, Licata A, Scheffler A, Battistella G, Grasso SM, Bogley R, Ratnasiri BM, La Joie R, Mundada NS, Europa E, Rabinovici G, Miller BL, De Leon J, Henry ML, Miller Z, Gorno-Tempini ML

Examining the relation between bilingualism and age of symptom onset in frontotemporal dementia.

Bilingualism (Cambridge, England)

de Leon J, Grasso S, Allen IE, Escueta DP, Vega Y, Eshghavi M, Watson C, Dronkers N, Gorno-Tempini ML, Henry ML

Visual and social differences in dyslexia: deep phenotyping of four cases with spared phonology.

Neurocase

Palser ER, Miller ZA, Licata AE, Yabut NA, Sudarsan SP, Tee BL, Deleon JA, Mandelli ML, Caverzasi E, Sturm VE, Hendren R, Possin KL, Miller BL, Gorno Tempini ML, Watson Pereira C

Automated Detection of Speech Timing Alterations in Autopsy-Confirmed Non-fluent/agrammatic Variant Primary Progressive Aphasia.

Neurology

García AM, Welch AE, Mandelli ML, Henry ML, Lukic S, Torres Prioris MJ, Deleon J, Ratnasiri BM, Lorca Puls DL, Miller BL, Seeley W, Vogel AP, Gorno-Tempini ML

Automated Detection of Speech Timing Alterations in Autopsy-Confirmed Nonfluent/Agrammatic Variant Primary Progressive Aphasia.

Neurology

Garc?a AM, Welch AE, Mandelli ML, Henry ML, Lukic S, Torres Prioris MJ, Deleon J, Ratnasiri BM, Lorca-Puls DL, Miller BL, Seeley W, Vogel AP, Gorno-Tempini ML

Frontotemporal dementia: A unique window on the functional role of the temporal lobes.

Handbook of clinical neurology

Borghesani V, DeLeon J, Gorno-Tempini ML

Children with developmental dyslexia show elevated parasympathetic nervous system activity at rest and greater cardiac deceleration during an empathy task.

Biological psychology

Palser ER, Morris NA, Roy ARK, Holley SR, Veziris CR, Watson C, Deleon J, Miller ZA, Miller BL, Gorno-Tempini ML, Sturm VE

Tonal and orthographic analysis in a Cantonese-speaking individual with nonfluent/agrammatic variant primary progressive aphasia.

Neurocase

Tee BL, Deleon J, Chen Li Ying LK, Miller BL, Y Lo R, Europa E, Sudarsan S, Grasso S, Gorno-Tempini ML

Functional and morphological correlates of developmental dyslexia: A multimodal investigation of the ventral occipitotemporal cortex.

Journal of neuroimaging : official journal of the American Society of Neuroimaging

Borghesani V, Wang C, Watson C, Bouhali F, Caverzasi E, Battistella G, Bogley R, Yabut NA, Deleon J, Miller ZA, Hoeft F, Mandelli ML, Gorno-Tempini ML

Dissociating nouns and verbs in temporal and perisylvian networks: Evidence from neurodegenerative diseases.

Cortex; a journal devoted to the study of the nervous system and behavior

Lukic S, Borghesani V, Weis E, Welch A, Bogley R, Neuhaus J, Deleon J, Miller ZA, Kramer JH, Miller BL, Dronkers NF, Gorno-Tempini ML

Enhanced visceromotor emotional reactivity in dyslexia and its relation to salience network connectivity.

Cortex; a journal devoted to the study of the nervous system and behavior

Sturm VE, Roy ARK, Datta S, Wang C, Sible IJ, Holley SR, Watson C, Palser ER, Morris NA, Battistella G, Rah E, Meyer M, Pakvasa M, Mandelli ML, Deleon J, Hoeft F, Caverzasi E, Miller ZA, Shapiro KA, Hendren R, Miller BL, Gorno-Tempini ML

Effects of bilingualism on age at onset in two clinical Alzheimer's disease variants.

Alzheimer's & dementia : the journal of the Alzheimer's Association

de Leon J, Grasso SM, Welch A, Miller Z, Shwe W, Rabinovici GD, Miller BL, Henry ML, Gorno-Tempini ML

Speech production differences in English and Italian speakers with nonfluent variant PPA.

Neurology

Canu E, Agosta F, Battistella G, Spinelli EG, DeLeon J, Welch AE, Mandelli ML, Hubbard HI, Moro A, Magnani G, Cappa SF, Miller BL, Filippi M, Gorno-Tempini ML

Task-free functional language networks: reproducibility and clinical application.

The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience

Battistella G, Borghesani V, Henry M, Shwe W, Lauricella M, Miller Z, Deleon J, Miller BL, Dronkers N, Brambati SM, Seeley WW, Luisa Mandelli M, Luisa Gorno-Tempini M

Verbal Semantics and the Left Dorsolateral Anterior Temporal Lobe: A Longitudinal Case of Bilateral Temporal Degeneration.

Aphasiology

Vonk JMJ, Borghesani V, Battistella G, Younes K, DeLeon J, Welch A, Hubbard HI, Miller ZA, Miller BL, Gorno-Tempini ML

Atypical clinical features associated with mixed pathology in a case of non-fluent variant primary progressive aphasia.

Neurocase

De Leon J, Mandelli ML, Nolan A, Miller ZA, Mead C, Watson C, Welch AE, Henry ML, Bourakova V, La Joie R, Bajorek LP, Grinberg L, Rabinovici G, Miller BL, Gorno-Tempini ML

Differential intrinsic functional connectivity changes in semantic variant primary progressive aphasia.

NeuroImage. Clinical

Battistella G, Henry M, Gesierich B, Wilson SM, Borghesani V, Shwe W, Miller Z, Deleon J, Miller BL, Jovicich J, Papinutto N, Dronkers NF, Seeley WW, Mandelli ML, Gorno-Tempini ML

Altered topology of the functional speech production network in non-fluent/agrammatic variant of PPA.

Cortex; a journal devoted to the study of the nervous system and behavior

Mandelli ML, Welch AE, Vilaplana E, Watson C, Battistella G, Brown JA, Possin KL, Hubbard HI, Miller ZA, Henry ML, Marx GA, Santos-Santos MA, Bajorek LP, Fortea J, Boxer A, Rabinovici G, Lee S, Deleon J, Rosen HJ, Miller BL, Seeley WW, Gorno-Tempini ML

Frontotemporal dementia.

Handbook of clinical neurology

Deleon J, Miller BL

Defects of mutant DNMT1 are linked to a spectrum of neurological disorders.

Brain : a journal of neurology

Baets J, Duan X, Wu Y, Smith G, Seeley WW, Mademan I, McGrath NM, Beadell NC, Khoury J, Botuyan MV, Mer G, Worrell GA, Hojo K, DeLeon J, Laura M, Liu YT, Senderek J, Weis J, Van den Bergh P, Merrill SL, Reilly MM, Houlden H, Grossman M, Scherer SS, De Jonghe P, Dyck PJ, Klein CJ

Elicitation of specific syntactic structures in primary progressive aphasia.

Brain and language

Deleon J, Gesierich B, Besbris M, Ogar J, Henry ML, Miller BL, Gorno-Tempini ML, Wilson SM

Syntactic processing depends on dorsal language tracts.

Neuron

Wilson SM, Galantucci S, Tartaglia MC, Rising K, Patterson DK, Henry ML, Ogar JM, DeLeon J, Miller BL, Gorno-Tempini ML

Adult glial precursor proliferation in mutant SOD1G93A mice.

Glia

Magnus T, Carmen J, Deleon J, Xue H, Pardo AC, Lepore AC, Mattson MP, Rao MS, Maragakis NJ

Neural regions essential for distinct cognitive processes underlying picture naming.

Brain : a journal of neurology

DeLeon J, Gottesman RF, Kleinman JT, Newhart M, Davis C, Heidler-Gary J, Lee A, Hillis AE