Population Studies: Quantify the exposome (Milestone 1.B)
Quantify the exposome in existing and new AD cohorts to gain a more precise measure of environmental exposure factors and their relationship to AD risk and individual trajectories of disease progression. These studies should employ a life-course approach across diverse populations (e.g., race, ethnicity, immigration status, geographical region, education, age, gender) and incorporate methods aimed at understanding how ancestry, race/ethnicity, sex, gender, and socioeconomic disparities interact with exposome factors to modulate AD risk.
Success Criteria
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Provide supplemental funding to at least 6 clinical research studies to explore the impact of environmental exposure on the pathogenesis of AD and AD-related dementias and on responsiveness to treatment.
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Launch at least three clinical research studies that incorporate deep molecular phenotyping, new environmental and behavioral sensors and mobile health technologies for cognitive assessment to detect the impact of the exposome on AD risk and resilience.
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Provide funding to enhance existing data resources with information on early life exposures/events.
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Provide funding to enhance administrative data linkages.
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Support research that will enable comparative analysis of the exposome within and among populations to understand the impacts of exposures on disease outcomes.
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Develop open and democratized data resources and FAIR (findable, accessible, interoperable, reusable) data practices to increase the reach of AD/ADRD-relevant exposome research across a wide-array of stakeholder groups and encourage the adoption of exposomic-related ontologies for data interoperability.
Summary of Key Accomplishments
NIA supports nationally representative cohorts that capture data on environmental factors for dementia risk, including the Health and Retirement Study (HRS), Harmonized Cognitive Assessment Protocol (HCAP) in the U.S. NIA also supports studies harmonized to HRS in several other countries. HRS collects demographic information and blood samples for people age 51 and older. The HCAP enables researchers to measure and understand dementia risk in ongoing longitudinal studies of aging around the world by using similar methods.
NIA also supports educational cohort studies seeking to understand education and other social factors as risk and protective factors for dementia across the life course. NIA has also launched a new funding initiative to enhance measures of educational exposures and cognitive assessments in existing studies to support this work.
The key accomplishments summary is current as of July 2022.
- Research Implementation Area
- Population Studies and Precision Medicine
- Timeline
- 2016–2024
- Status
- In Progress
Accomplishments/Implementation Activities
Funding Initiatives
- PAR-15-349: Health Disparities and Alzheimer's Disease (R01)
- PAR-15-350: Emerging Directions for Addressing Health Disparities in Alzheimer's Disease (R03)
- PAR-15-356: Major Opportunities for Research in Epidemiology of Alzheimer’s Disease and Cognitive Resilience (R01)
- RFA-AG-16-021: Collaborative Aging (in Place) Research Using Technology (CART) (U2C)
- PAR-19-070: Research on Current Topics in Alzheimer's Disease and Its Related Dementias (R01 Clinical Trial Optional)
- NOT-AG-18-053 Notice to Specify High-Priority Research Topic for PAR-19-070 and PAR-19-071 (Major Opportunities for Research in Epidemiology of Alzheimer's Disease and Related Dementias and Cognitive Resilience) replaces PAR-15-356
- NOT-AG-18-047 Notice to Specify High-Priority Research Topic for PAR-19-070 and PAR-19-071 (Health Disparities and Alzheimer’s Disease) replaces PAR-15-349 and PAR-15-350
- PAR-19-071: Research on Current Topics in Alzheimer's Disease and Its Related Dementias (R21 Clinical Trial Not Allowed)
- PAR-19-373: Research on biopsychosocial factors of social connectedness and isolation on health, wellbeing, illness, and recovery
- RFA-AG-17-061: Interdisciplinary Research to Understand the Complex Biology of Resilience to Alzheimer’s Disease Risk (R01)
- RFA-AG-18-029: Interdisciplinary Research to Understand the Complex Biology of Resilience to Alzheimer’s Disease Risk (R01)
- RFA-MH-19-510: Novel Mechanism Research on Neuropsychiatric Symptoms (NPS) in Alzheimer's Dementia (R01/R21)
- RFA-MH-19-511: Novel Mechanism Research on Neuropsychiatric Symptoms (NPS) in Alzheimer's Dementia (R01/R21)
- NOT-AG-20-038: Sex and Gender Differences in Alzheimer’s Disease and Alzheimer’s Disease-Related Dementias (AD/ADRD)
- NOT-AG-21-015 Network for Identification, Evaluation, and Tracking of Older Persons with Superior Cognitive Performance for Their Chronological Age (U19 Clinical Trial Not Allowed)
Research Programs and Resources
- Area Deprivation Index (University of Wisconsin) – "Neighborhood Atlas"
- US HCAP Data is released: 2016 Harmonized Cognitive Assessment Protocol (HCAP) Early, Version 1.0
- Mexi-Cog (MHAS HCAP) is released: MHAS Cognitive Aging Ancillary Study – Mex-Cog
- Rancho Bernardo Study of Healthy Aging Cognitive Function Data are released
- Gateway to Global Aging Data
- Epidemiological Integration of Genetic Variants and Metabolomics Profiles in Washington Heights Columbia Aging Project
- Framingham Heart Study – Brain Aging Program
- Resilience AD Program
- Psych-AD: Neuropsychiatric Symptoms in Alzheimer’s Disease
- Webinar: ADRC Social Determinants of Health