Unveiling the mysteries of Alzheimer's disease with MRI
Mayo Clinic's Aging and Dementia Imaging Research Laboratory, led by Clifford R. Jack Jr., M.D.; Kejal Kantarci, M.D.; and Prashanthi Vemuri, Ph.D., is working to better understand how to identify Alzheimer's disease and related dementias before symptoms surface.
Overview
The Aging and Dementia Imaging Research Laboratory is engaged in brain-imaging research in cognitive aging and Alzheimer's disease and related disorders. The lab uses imaging to study the biology of brain aging and cognitive impairment. The team also develops image-processing algorithms to quantitatively measure the information obtained from brain imaging. The group is led by Clifford R. Jack Jr., founder; Kejal Kantarci, M.D.; and Prashanthi Vemuri, Ph.D.
The Aging and Dementia Imaging Research Lab's team studies what constitutes normal aging of the brain and how pathological aging and neurodegenerative diseases differ from typical aging. Specific goals include understanding how:
- Various imaging measures relate to neuropathology.
- Imaging relates to cognitive, behavioral and specific phenotypic abnormalities cross-sectionally.
- Imaging relates to longitudinal change on cognition and behavior.
- Longitudinal change on imaging relates to simultaneous longitudinal change on cognition and behavior.
The lab's clinical imaging research is tightly integrated into the National Institutes of Health-funded longitudinal clinical and epidemiologic research projects in normal aging, Alzheimer's disease and other dementias through the Mayo Clinic Alzheimer's Disease Patient Registry and Alzheimer's Disease Research Center. The lab also collaborates with several investigators outside Mayo Clinic and serves as the imaging center for several large national multisite studies.
Affiliations
The Aging and Dementia Imaging Research Laboratory works closely with these Mayo Clinic research groups: