The National Institutes of Health (NIH) has awarded UC Davis Health a $15.85 million grant to support the next phase of one of the nation’s most extensive studies on brain aging in Hispanic-Latino communities.
Latinos are one of the fastest growing demographic groups in the United States. They also have a higher risk of heart and vascular diseases and are more prone to developing mild cognitive impairment (MCI) or dementia than people from other groups. Still, Latinos remain underrepresented in research on aging and dementia.
The grant will support the creation of the most comprehensive long-term dataset on Hispanic and Latino brain aging to date.
“Our goal is to identify the factors that matter most for healthy cognitive aging — and ultimately reduce the burden of dementia for millions of families. Our new study will give us an unprecedented ability to understand how the brain changes over time in Latino communities,” said Charles DeCarli , UC Davis distinguished professor of neurology and the study’s principal investigator. DeCarli is also the co-director of the UC Davis Alzheimer’s Disease Research Center .
The study will track brain and cognitive changes in Latinos from diverse backgrounds, reflecting the wide range of ancestry, culture and health experiences within Latino populations that can influence how the brain ages.
“Latino communities have been historically overlooked in aging research. This grant allows us to change that,” said UC San Diego professor Héctor González , co-principal investigator on this new grant. “By studying brain health in a diverse and deeply characterized Latino cohort, we can develop better tools for early detection and more effective strategies for prevention that truly reflect our communities.”
Developing precision medicine to serve everyone
In 2008, Gonzalez and a team of researchers launched the Hispanic Community Health Study/Study of Latinos (HCHS/SOL), the nation’s largest study of Hispanic and Latino health and disease in the United States.
“At that time, most of the field focused on older adults — mostly people in their 70s and 80s. This was a challenge for researchers studying cognitive aging and dementias,” explained Gonzalez. “So, we took a life course framework to capture maladies, such as diabetes and hypertension, which show up at different phases of life.”
Their study enrolled a relatively younger cohort of Hispanic and Latino participants. It included more than 16,000 Latino participants from continental (Mexico, South America and Central America) and Caribbean (Cuba, Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico) Latino origins. The multi-site study enrolled participants in four centers: Miami, San Diego, Chicago and New York.
“What's unique about HCHS/SOL is that it was designed to get representative samples of people who come from various Hispanic-Latino backgrounds,” DeCarli said. “There are widely varying social, economic, environmental exposures, as well as genetic differences within the Latino community that may influence risk for dementia and need to be further studied.”
DeCarli and González collaborated with other researchers to produce the largest collection of brain MRI scans from this Latino cohort in a sub-study called SOL-INCA-MRI. With scans from 2,668 participants, they learned how sleep, blood vessel health and genetics influence brain aging.
The next phase of deciphering brain mysteries
The new NIH grant allows the team to shift from single-time-point snapshots to long-term tracking of participants’ brain health. Over a period of around 12 years, the researchers will closely follow about 1,800 Latino adults. They will collect repeated MRI scans, blood biomarkers, health and lifestyle information and data from cognitive testing.
The goal is to better understand how Alzheimer’s disease, vascular injury and other brain changes develop over time — and why Latino adults face higher rates of certain cognitive disorders. The aim is to:
“This new grant will allow us to build on our previous work and better understand the temporal factor affecting MCI and dementia,” DeCarli said.
Understanding the multiple factors contributing to bad brain aging
The study presents a very unique and comprehensive approach to learning about brain health. It examines the role genes play, in addition to life-course events and aging. It presents a precision medicine approach to ensure that patients’ needs are met with the right medicine and the right understanding.
“We want to address dementia and Alzheimer's disease, but we also want to address the other pathologies contributing to bad brain aging,” explained González. “What's truly unique and powerful about this study is the recognition, appreciation and emphasis on understanding these other pathologies by using data from the MRIs and biomarker panels.”
DeCarli and González hope that by understanding the modifiable risk factors (such as high blood pressure), there might be an opportunity to change the trajectory of brain aging and keep people's cognition intact.