Research Update

Decisional Capacity in Mild Cognitive Impairment

Dr. Angela Jefferson, principal investigator of the ADMIRE (Aging and Decision Making) study, and her colleagues recently found that some individuals with mild cognitive impairment (MCI) perform differently on decisional capacity measures assessing their ability to provide informed consent to a complicated but hypothetical clinical trial when compared to their cognitively normal peers. Dr. Jefferson's work is in collaboration with Dr. Jason Karlawish, the Education & Information Transfer Core Director of the University of Pennsylvania Alzheimer's Disease Center. These findings are scheduled to appear in the Journal of the American Geriatrics Society later this spring.

Functional Impairment in Mild Cognitive Impairment

Dr. Angela Jefferson and colleagues have also recently published findings in the American Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry on the functional abilities of individuals with MCI. Their findings suggest that older adults with MCI do not differ from their cognitively normal peers on traditional measures of functional assessment. However, error-based measures of functional skills may capture the subtle evolving functional decline associated with MCI. These error behaviors are most strongly associated with verbal learning performance, possibly secondary to the hallmark memory impairment associated with MCI.

Ibuprofen's Effects on Mice Brains

Drs. Ann McKee, Neil Kowall, and Alpaslan Dedeoglu presented findings in Brain Research related to their work with ibuprofen and triple transgenic Alzheimer's disease (AD) type mice. AD type mice had improved performance on a water maze test after being fed ibuprofen-supplemented food. Those mice also showed significant decreases in oligomeric beta amyloid (Aβ) and hyperphosphorylated tau immunoreactivity in the hippocampus. The research team's findings suggest that ibuprofen can reduce both cognitive deficits and the Aβ and tau deposits that are believed to be contributing factors to AD in mice.

Memory Enhancements with Pictures

Dr. Brandon Ally and colleagues recently found that, compared to words, pictures increase memory by enhancing recollection in healthy older adults. Interestingly, this picture superiority effect is significantly greater in patients with AD. That is, the degree to which patients remember pictures compared to words is far greater among patients with AD than healthy control subjects. Dr. Ally and his team are currently investigating what memory processes are associated with this finding and they are developing strategies, such as mental imagery, to improve memory for words.

Parietal Lobe Function

Dr. Andrew Budson, in collaboration with Drs. Jon Simons and Brandon Ally, has used converging data from functional magnetic resonance imaging, event-related potentials, and patients with brain lesions to better understand the role of the parietal lobe in memory function in younger and older adults. The research team speculated that the parietal cortex is important for an individual's subjective recollective experience, and findings from this study were recently published in Neuropsychologia.

• Alfred Davis Receives Prestigious Award
• PAIRS Program Provides Education Outside Classroom
• American Academy of Neurology Meeting
• New Faculty Member
• Research Update
• StoryCorps Visits Boston University
• Greater Boston Memory Walk
• Actively Recruiting Studies
• BU ADC Happenings
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• Honorary and Memorial Contributions