Alzheimer's disease is both progressive and irreversible. Its effects can be heartbreaking, impacting a patient's memory and thinking skills, but also his or her ability to carry out simple tasks. We don't know what causes Alzheimer's, or why it affects certain people—but our neurosciences researchers are learning more every day. Studying the brains of hundreds of healthy participants (some for 20 years now!), we observe changes over time that could predict early disease. We've identified five biomarkers that we believe will help us develop a simple test that can detect a person's risk long before symptoms are present. And with a disease like Alzheimer's, early diagnosis is essential to our #1 goal: developing treatments that will stop or delay further decline.

• Close to six million Americans are living with Alzheimer's disease.
• Watching a loved one slowly decline creates chronic stress on families, both financially and emotionally.
• By 2029, HMRI hopes to offer our five-part biomarker testing to the general public, which could help to stop or slow the onset of Alzheimer's for millions.

A special part of our Alzheimer's research focuses on the unique occupational risk of our military. In their work to protect our freedoms, these men and women endure stress and sometimes trauma that can have lasting effects. Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) can negatively impact a person's mental health and lead to a number of cognitive disorders later in life, including Alzheimer's and related dementia. Our scientists specially recruit Veterans to be willing participants in our PTSD research, allowing us to study their brains and observe changes over time. We are learning how trauma can make a person more susceptible to Alzheimer's disease. We know that traumatic brain injury (TBI), especially repeated concussions, increases the risk of dementia— particularly chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), a progressive brain disorder that is gaining recognition from high-profile injuries sustained in football or soccer. Now, we are exploring whether new and non-invasive testing found from our Brain Aging study may help to predict whether those with pre-clinical brain damage might be predisposed to CTE. And the more we learn, the closer we come to developing treatments.

PTSD can be chronically disabling. An estimated 17% of veterans who served in active combat report signs of PTSD. And while not all veterans experienced concussive brain trauma, a significant number experienced social, psychological, sexual and/or abusive stress—all of which can also lead to PTSD.

Headache disorders like migraine come with serious pain and disability, impacting jobs, productivity and quality of life. About 40% go undiagnosed and without treatment, relying solely on over-the-counter medications that provide little relief. Our neurosciences team is delving into the unknowns of migraine—why it affects some people but not others, and how the headaches are triggered. In studying the brains of individuals who do suffer, as well as those who don't, we've found brain sodium to be an exciting common pathway. People with migraine appear to have irregular brain sodium, with wild swings of sodium being a trigger of these debilitating headaches. Our goal is to someday control the brain sodium—and, in doing so, bring lasting relief to millions.

• 15% of adults suffer from migraine.
• Headache disorders are the third highest cause worldwide of years lost due to disability. Migraine alone is the sixth highest.
• The economic impact of migraine in the US is an estimated $13-$17 billion annually.
• Anxiety and depression are significantly more common in people who suffer from migraine.
• Only two-thirds had been correctly diagnosed. Most were solely reliant on over-the-counter medications.