Beau M. Ances, MD, PhD, MSc is the David J. Brennan, MD Professor of Neurology. His laboratory studies non-invasive neuroimaging biomarkers of cognitive and neurological function in people with HIV, Alzheimer’s Disease, Creutzfeld-Jacob Disease, and paraneoplastic disorders. He is the Washington University site leader for the Alzheimer’s Disease Neuroimaging Initiative (ADNI) and is a member of the Executive committee for the Knight ADRC.
Tammie L.S. Benzinger, MD, PhD, is a Professor of Radiology and Neurological Surgery and serves as Medical Director for the MRI service at the Mallinckrodt Institute of Radiology. Dr. Benzinger’s research group primarily focuses on the study of aging, Alzheimer’s disease, and related disorders. The laboratory pioneers translational PET and MR imaging to investigate biomarkers for detecting and diagnosing degenerative brain diseases before symptoms occur. Her group also serves as the imaging core for the Knight ADRC, and for the international studies of autosomal dominant AD, the Dominantly Inherited Alzheimer Network (DIAN) and the DIAN-Therapeutic Unit.
Lisa T. Connor, PhD, Professor of Occupational Therapy and Neurology, is the Director of the Program in Occupational Therapy at Washington University School of Medicine and an experimental psychologist by training. Her research focuses on how older adults reintegrate into the community after stroke by examining barriers and facilitators, particularly cognitive, social, and emotional factors. Her lab seeks to understand age-related, stroke-related, and aphasia-related changes in participation in everyday activities to develop effective interventions that maximize participation.
Brian A. Gordon, PhD, Assistant Professor of Radiology studies healthy and pathological aging and is an alumnus of this program. His main interest is in understanding what biological, environmental, and social factors can bolster or hamper successful aging with an emphasis on the development of Alzheimer’s Disease. In order to pursue these research questions he integrates a variety of techniques including cognitive testing, neuroimaging (e.g. structural and functional MRI, PET imaging), biofluid assays (CSF and blood) and genetics.
Manu S. Goyal, MD, MSc, Associate Professor of Radiology, Neurology and Neuroscience is a clinical neuroradiologist at the Mallinckrodt Institute of Radiology and tenured investigator within the Neuroimaging Laboratories. His investigations focus on metabolic and vascular changes in the human brain during aging, the sources of these changes, and how these might impart or reflect varying degrees of resilience to neurodegenerative disease. His laboratory, which is co-led with Dr. Andrei Vlassenko, utilizes state-of-the-art PET and MRI techniques to measure various aspects of brain structure and physiology, as well as neurodegenerative pathology.
Eric Lenze, MD, Wallace & Lucille Renard Professor of Psychiatry, is a geriatric psychiatrist and clinical trialist whose research focuses on treatment of late-life depression and anxiety disorders, and remediation of age-related cognitive decline, with biobehavioral interventions spanning from medication to psychotherapy, mindfulness, cognitive training, and exercise. He is also the PI of the NIMH-funded Center for Perioperative Mental Health, which focuses on optimizing mental health for older adults in surgical settings using combined pharmacological and behavioral approaches. He has a strong emphasis on precision medicine, and he recently proposed the framework called the Precision Clinical Trial (Lenze et al, JAMA Psychiatry 2020). His clinical research has also included traditional biomarker strategies (including neuroimaging, genotyping, and stress and inflammatory markers).
Chenyang Lu, PhD, Professor of Computer Science and Engineering, has worked extensively in the areas of clinical machine learning and mobile health, specializing in early warning systems and predictive models using electronic health record (EHR) and wearable device data. He develops machine learning models to predict depression remission and weight loss of older adults undergoing lifestyle interventions. He also studies wearable devices and fall detection technologies for measuring falls of community dwelling older adults. He is a member of the Division of Computational & Data Sciences and the Institute of Informatics at Washington University.
Lori Markson, PhD, Associate Professor of Psychological & Brain Sciences, is a developmental psychologist who studies cognitive and social-cognitive development, with a focus on children’s understanding of social categories, children’s concepts of race and racism, and the development of epistemic and social trust in infants and children, with the goal of achieving more equitable educational and health outcomes for all children.
John C. Morris, MD, the Friedman Distinguished Professor of Neurology, directs the Knight ADRC at Washington University School of Medicine. Using multimodal molecular biomarkers, Dr. Morris investigates the development and progression of preclinical Alzheimer disease, antecedent to the development of symptoms of the disorder, in cohorts supported by the Knight ADRC and its two affiliated Program Project Grants, which Dr. Morris also directs.
Nancy Morrow-Howell, MSW, PhD, is on the faculty of the George Warren Brown School of Social Work at Washington University and holds the Bettie Bofinger Brown Distinguished Professorship. She is also the Director of the Harvey A. Friedman Center for Aging; and in that role, she promotes gerontological research and education across disciplines, schools, and departments. Dr. Morrow-Howell is past president and fellow of the Gerontological Society of America. Her scholarship focuses on the productive engagement in later life, specifically program and policies to optimally engage older adults in paid and unpaid work, including working, volunteering, and caregiving.
Joel Myerson, PhD, Research Professor of Psychological & Brain Sciences, collaborates with Dr. Hale on research on age-related changes in working memory and processing speed. He has also been collaborating with Professors Len Green and Todd Braver on work related to reward processing in older adult decision making.
Rebecca Treiman, PhD, Burke and Elizabeth High Baker Professor, specializes in the study of child development and language and is known for her research on spelling and reading. She participates in the Aging & Development Brown Bag meetings and is involved in discussions about the progress of graduate students and postdocs in the training program, bringing a lifespan developmental perspective.
Nancy Tye-Murray, PhD, is a Professor in the Department of Otolaryngology at Washington University School of Medicine and the Principal Investigator of the WUSM Audiovisual Laboratory. Her research falls into two areas, aural rehabilitation for persons who are hearing impaired and mechanisms of audiovisual integration. She is the former Director of Research at Central Institute for the Deaf and the author of the introductory textbook used in most graduate speech and hearing programs, “Foundations of Aural Rehabilitation: Children, Adults, and Their Family Members” (5th Ed).