R01AG067557

Contributions of Stress Reactivity to Risk of Alzheimer's Disease and Related Dementias in a Community-Based Cohort

Racial/ethnic minority adults are at higher risk for Alzheimer's Disease and Related Dementias (ADRD). Moreover, minority adults are not only exposed to more intense and frequent stressful situations in their daily lives, but they also have fewer resources to manage these situations in healthy ways. Limited resources among these adults may lead to impaired physiologic stress responses (i.e., stress reactivity), specifically dysregulation of the sympathetic nervous system and the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenocortical (HPA) axis.

Our understanding of the impact of stress reactivity on ADRD risk comes from animal studies and experiments in humans using controlled, laboratory stressors. This is a major limitation because laboratory stressors cannot capture the variety, severity, or duration of stressors that individuals face in their daily lives. Thus, there remains a need to more rigorously evaluate relationships of stress reactivity with ADRD risk in natural settings.

We propose to fill this critical gap in the literature by adding more personalized and objective indicators of stress and stress reactivity to a longstanding community-based cohort, the Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis (MESA). We will use existing gene expression data to calculate a molecular marker of the physiologic response to chronic exposure to adversity. We will also collect repeated measurements of stressful experiences, negative affect (emotions), and heart rate in order to develop participant-specific markers of affective and autonomic stress reactivity, respectively.

Our overall goal is to use these measures to examine associations of the body's response to stressful experiences with risk of ADRD in a natural setting. We will leverage existing and ongoing repeated assessments of cognitive function as well as ongoing assessments of neuroimaging biomarkers of both vascular and AD pathology, including cerebral blood flow (CBF), white matter hyperintensities, amyloid-beta deposition, and gray matter volume loss.

Our proposed study will allow us to begin to disentangle the pathways through which stress exposure and stress reactivity impact vascular dementia pathology and/or AD positivity. Findings will inform stress management interventions and precision medicine initiatives designed to prevent ADRD and/or slow its progression.

Northwestern University

TO ENCOURAGE BIOMEDICAL, SOCIAL, AND BEHAVIORAL RESEARCH AND RESEARCH TRAINING DIRECTED TOWARD GREATER UNDERSTANDING OF THE AGING PROCESS AND THE DISEASES, SPECIAL PROBLEMS, AND NEEDS OF PEOPLE AS THEY AGE. THE NATIONAL INSTITUTE ON AGING HAS ESTABLISHED PROGRAMS TO PURSUE THESE GOALS. THE DIVISION OF AGING BIOLOGY EMPHASIZES UNDERSTANDING THE BASIC BIOLOGICAL PROCESSES OF AGING. THE DIVISION OF GERIATRICS AND CLINICAL GERONTOLOGY SUPPORTS RESEARCH TO IMPROVE THE ABILITIES OF HEALTH CARE PRACTITIONERS TO RESPOND TO THE DISEASES AND OTHER CLINICAL PROBLEMS OF OLDER PEOPLE. THE DIVISION OF BEHAVIORAL AND SOCIAL RESEARCH SUPPORTS RESEARCH THAT WILL LEAD TO GREATER UNDERSTANDING OF THE SOCIAL, CULTURAL, ECONOMIC AND PSYCHOLOGICAL FACTORS THAT AFFECT BOTH THE PROCESS OF GROWING OLD AND THE PLACE OF OLDER PEOPLE IN SOCIETY. THE DIVISION OF NEUROSCIENCE FOSTERS RESEARCH CONCERNED WITH THE AGE-RELATED CHANGES IN THE NERVOUS SYSTEM AS WELL AS THE RELATED SENSORY, PERCEPTUAL, AND COGNITIVE PROCESSES ASSOCIATED WITH AGING AND HAS A SPECIAL EMPHASIS ON ALZHEIMER'S DISEASE. SMALL BUSINESS INNOVATION RESEARCH (SBIR) PROGRAM: TO EXPAND AND IMPROVE THE SBIR PROGRAM, TO INCREASE PRIVATE SECTOR COMMERCIALIZATION OF INNOVATIONS DERIVED FROM FEDERAL RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT, TO INCREASE SMALL BUSINESS PARTICIPATION IN FEDERAL RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT, AND TO FOSTER AND ENCOURAGE PARTICIPATION OF SOCIALLY AND ECONOMICALLY DISADVANTAGED SMALL BUSINESS CONCERNS AND WOMEN-OWNED SMALL BUSINESS CONCERNS IN TECHNOLOGICAL INNOVATION. SMALL BUSINESS TECHNOLOGY TRANSFER (STTR) PROGRAM: TO STIMULATE AND FOSTER SCIENTIFIC AND TECHNOLOGICAL INNOVATION THROUGH COOPERATIVE RESEARCH DEVELOPMENT CARRIED OUT BETWEEN SMALL BUSINESS CONCERNS AND RESEARCH INSTITUTIONS, TO FOSTER TECHNOLOGY TRANSFER BETWEEN SMALL BUSINESS CONCERNS AND RESEARCH INSTITUTIONS, TO INCREASE PRIVATE SECTOR COMMERCIALIZATION OF INNOVATIONS DERIVED FROM FEDERAL RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT, AND TO FOSTER AND ENCOURAGE PARTICIPATION OF SOCIALLY AND ECONOMICALLY DISADVANTAGED SMALL BUSINESS CONCERNS AND WOMEN-OWNED SMALL BUSINESS CONCERNS IN TECHNOLOGICAL INNOVATION.

93.866 - Aging Research

National Institute on Aging (NIA) [HHS - NIH]

Chicago, Illinois 606114407 United States

Single Zip Code

Research on Current Topics in Alzheimer's Disease and Its Related Dementias (R01 Clinical Trial Optional) (PAR-19-070)

Amendment Since initial award the total obligations have increased 284% from $1,673,246 to $6,416,931.