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Research

27,380 Alzheimer's and dementia studies in plain English, each scored out of 100.

Find studies

Showing 1–24 of 24 studies in Brain scans and imaging · free to read · tagged Genetics · 27,380 in the whole library · How the 0–100 score works

Browse by subject, author or institution

Each number is how many studies that link shows, with your other filters kept.

Other subjects

Authors

Names as each record prints them; the same person can appear under two spellings.

Institutions

From OpenAlex; 12,859 studies have no institution on record and are not counted here.

What “Brain scans and imaging” covers

Brain scans and imaging — MRI, PET and other scans: what they show, how early, and how reliably.

A note on reading research. One study is rarely the final word.

We try to note the size of a study, whether it was in humans or animals, and how early-stage the finding is. If a summary here doesn't make that clear, treat it with extra caution and check the original source.

Spatial patterns of neuroimaging biomarker change in individuals from families with autosomal dominant Alzheimer's disease: a longitudinal study

✓ Peer-reviewed alzhub usefulness score 77 out of 100. The Lancet. Neurology 2018-02-01

We found a sequence to pathological changes, with rates of Aβ deposition in mutation carriers being significantly different from those in non-carriers first (across regions that showed a significant difference, at a mean of 18·9 years [SD 3·3] before expected onset), followed by hypometabolism (14·1 years [5·1] before expected onset), and lastly structural decline (4·7 years [4·2] before expected onset). 2 key findings →

Design: longitudinal study Participants: 346 Evidence: moderate

Full summary, score breakdown and related studies → Original source Free full text

Soluble TREM2 in CSF and its association with other biomarkers and cognition in autosomal-dominant Alzheimer's disease: a longitudinal observational study

✓ Peer-reviewed alzhub usefulness score 71 out of 100. The Lancet. Neurology 2022-04-01

Although studies in animal models suggest that TREM2 is protective against Alzheimer's pathology, its effect on tau pathology and its potential beneficial role in people with Alzheimer's disease is still unclear. 4 key findings →

Design: longitudinal study Participants: 155 Evidence: moderate

Full summary, score breakdown and related studies → Original source Free full text

Etiology of White Matter Hyperintensities in Autosomal Dominant and Sporadic Alzheimer Disease

✓ Peer-reviewed alzhub usefulness score 67 out of 100. JAMA neurology 2023-12-01

Data from 3960 MRI sessions among 1141 participants were included: 252 pathogenic variant carriers from DIAN (mean [SD] age, 38.4 [11.2] years; 137 [54%] female), 571 older adults from ADNI (mean [SD] age, 72.8 [7.3] years; 274 [48%] female), and 318 older adults from HABS (mean [SD] age, 72.4 [7.6] years; 194 [61%] female). 3 key findings →

Design: cohort study Participants: 1,141 Evidence: moderate

Full summary, score breakdown and related studies → Original source Free full text

Association of β-Amyloid and Apolipoprotein E ε4 With Memory Decline in Preclinical Alzheimer Disease

✓ Peer-reviewed alzhub usefulness score 66 out of 100. JAMA neurology 2018-04-01

However, the extent to which increasing age, Aβ, and ε4 are associated with memory decline remains unclear, and the age at which memory decline begins for Aβ-positive ε4 carriers and noncarriers has not been determined. 5 key findings →

Design: longitudinal study Participants: 1,583 Evidence: moderate

Full summary, score breakdown and related studies → Original source Free full text

Association Between Amyloid and Tau Accumulation in Young Adults With Autosomal Dominant Alzheimer Disease

✓ Peer-reviewed alzhub usefulness score 60 out of 100. JAMA neurology 2018-05-01

Compared with noncarriers, cognitively unimpaired mutation carriers had elevated mean cortical Pittsburgh Compound B distribution volume ratio levels in their late 20s, and 7 of 9 carriers older than 30 years reached the threshold for amyloidosis (distribution volume ratio level > 1.2). 4 key findings →

Design: cross-sectional Participants: 24 Evidence: low

Full summary, score breakdown and related studies → Original source Free full text

Tau PET in autosomal dominant Alzheimer's disease: relationship with cognition, dementia and other biomarkers

✓ Peer-reviewed alzhub usefulness score 59 out of 100. Brain : a journal of neurology 2019-04-01

Symptomatic mutation carriers also demonstrated elevated tau PET binding in the basal ganglia, consistent with prior work with amyloid-β. 2 key findings →

Design: cross-sectional Evidence: low

Full summary, score breakdown and related studies → Original source Free full text

The pattern of atrophy in familial Alzheimer disease: volumetric MRI results from the DIAN study

✓ Peer-reviewed alzhub usefulness score 59 out of 100. Neurology 2013-09-18

Atrophy in FAD is observed early, both in areas commonly associated with sporadic Alzheimer disease and also in the putamen and thalamus, 2 regions associated with early amyloid deposition in FAD mutation carriers. 4 key findings →

Design: cross-sectional Participants: 192 Evidence: low

Full summary, score breakdown and related studies → Original source Free full text

In vivo 18F-AV-1451 tau PET signal in MAPT mutation carriers varies by expected tau isoforms

✓ Peer-reviewed alzhub usefulness score 59 out of 100. Neurology 2018-02-09

Tau PET shows higher magnitude of binding in MAPT mutation carriers who harbor mutations that are more likely to produce AD-like tau pathology (e.g., in our series, the non-exon 10 families tend to accumulate mixed 3R/4R aggregates). 2 key findings →

Design: case-control study Participants: 13 Evidence: moderate

Full summary, score breakdown and related studies → Original source Free full text

Impaired default network functional connectivity in autosomal dominant Alzheimer disease

✓ Peer-reviewed alzhub usefulness score 58 out of 100. Neurology 2013-07-24

These findings suggest that DMN fcMRI may prove useful as a biomarker across a wide spectrum of disease, and support the feasibility of DMN fcMRI as a secondary endpoint in upcoming multicenter clinical trials in Alzheimer disease. 2 key findings →

Design: cross-sectional Evidence: moderate

Full summary, score breakdown and related studies → Original source Free full text

Choroid Plexus Volume and Permeability at Brain MRI within the Alzheimer Disease Clinical Spectrum

✓ Peer-reviewed alzhub usefulness score 56 out of 100. Radiology 2022-05-17

Among patients with cognitive symptoms, larger choroid plexus volume was associated with severity of cognitive impairment in the Alzheimer disease spectrum. 5 key findings →

Participants: 532 Evidence: low

Full summary, score breakdown and related studies → Original source Free full text

Sustainable method for Alzheimer dementia prediction in mild cognitive impairment: Electroencephalographic connectivity and graph theory combined with apolipoprotein E

✓ Peer-reviewed alzhub usefulness score 54 out of 100. Annals of neurology 2018-08-25

Concluding, this innovative EEG analysis, in combination with a genetic test (both low-cost and widely available), could evaluate on an individual basis with great precision the risk of MCI progression. 3 key findings →

Participants: 97 Evidence: low

Full summary, score breakdown and related studies → Original source Free full text

Cortical microstructural correlates of astrocytosis in autosomal-dominant Alzheimer disease

✓ Peer-reviewed alzhub usefulness score 54 out of 100. Neurology 2020-04-14

Our proof-of-concept study is the first to show that microstructural and macrostructural changes can reflect underlying neuroinflammatory mechanisms in early stages of Alzheimer disease (AD). 2 key findings →

Participants: 31 Evidence: low

Full summary, score breakdown and related studies → Original source Free full text

Differences in brain volume, hippocampal volume, cerebrovascular risk factors, and apolipoprotein E4 among mild cognitive impairment subtypes

✓ Peer-reviewed alzhub usefulness score 51 out of 100. Archives of neurology 2009-11-01

Amnestic forms of MCI appear to have demographic, genetic, and MRI findings suggestive of Alzheimer disease pathology, whereas the nonamnestic forms of MCI have findings suggestive of vascular disease. 4 key findings →

Design: cross-sectional Participants: 153 Evidence: low

Full summary, score breakdown and related studies → Original source Free full text

Alcohol intake in relation to brain magnetic resonance imaging findings in older persons without dementia

✓ Peer-reviewed alzhub usefulness score 46 out of 100. The American journal of clinical nutrition 2004-10-01

Light-to-moderate alcohol intake is associated with a lower prevalence of vascular brain findings and, in APOE epsilon4 carriers, hippocampal and amygdalar atrophy on MRI. 3 key findings →

Participants: 509 Evidence: low

Full summary, score breakdown and related studies → Original source Free full text

δ-Catenin is genetically and biologically associated with cortical cataract and future Alzheimer-related structural and functional brain changes

✓ Peer-reviewed alzhub usefulness score 46 out of 100. PloS one 2012-09-11

Multiple lines of evidence suggest that specific subtypes of age-related cataract (ARC) and Alzheimer disease (AD) are related etiologically. 5 key findings →

Evidence: low

Full summary, score breakdown and related studies → Original source Free full text

Youthful memory capacity in old brains: anatomic and genetic clues from the Northwestern SuperAging Project

✓ Peer-reviewed alzhub usefulness score 44 out of 100. Journal of cognitive neuroscience 2013-01-01

The Northwestern University SuperAging Project recruits community dwellers over the age of 80 who have unusually high performance on tests of episodic memory. 1 key finding →

Evidence: moderate

Full summary, score breakdown and related studies → Original source Free full text

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Where “Free full text” comes from

Free full text links and the Full text may need a subscription label come from Unpaywall, Europe PMC and OpenAlex records of free copies, checked 10 Oct 2026. A study with neither is unknown, not paywalled.

How the 0–100 score works — and why some entries are capped

This is alzhub's own score. It is not an official metric, not an impact factor, and no journal, publisher or ranking body endorses it. We built it so that a reader who is not a scientist can tell a landmark trial from a conference abstract without having to already know the difference. Every point comes from one of 20 components, all of them printed on the study itself, so you can disagree with our arithmetic rather than having to trust the total.

  • Journal tier up to 10 pts
  • Journal's citation record up to 4 pts
  • Study design up to 12 pts
  • Strength of evidence up to 5 pts
  • Peer-review validation up to 10 pts
  • How recent up to 5 pts
  • Sample size up to 4 pts
  • Effect reported up to 3 pts
  • Studied in people up to 3 pts
  • Randomised / blinded up to 2 pts
  • Times cited up to 7 pts
  • Citations per year up to 5 pts
  • Impact for its field and year up to 6 pts
  • Cited by studies here up to 6 pts
  • Still being cited up to 4 pts
  • Senior author's track record up to 4 pts
  • Institution's track record up to 3 pts
  • Multi-centre collaboration up to 3 pts
  • Indexed in PubMed up to 2 pts
  • Free to read up to 2 pts

Journals are placed in ordered tiers, never given a numeric impact factor — we could not verify current impact factors from a source we control, and an invented one would be worse than none. Tier 1 is the top-tier general journals (NEJM, The Lancet, JAMA, Nature, Science, Nature Medicine); tier 2 is the leading specialty journals; tier 3 is every other peer-reviewed journal. A separate part scores how much the journal's own papers are cited, which tells the tier-3 journals apart.

Two rules we don't bend. First, we never fill in a missing value: if a record does not state a sample size or a design, that component scores zero, and if we simply have no data for a part, such as a citation count, that part is left out and the study is scored on the parts we could check. The study card says which. Second, anything that is not a peer-reviewed article is capped at 16/100 and carries a warning chip — so a conference abstract or a company press release can never outrank a peer-reviewed paper, no matter how good it looks.

We rank a rigorous null result — a good trial showing that something does not work — above an early positive finding. Someone deciding whether to buy a supplement is served by that, and the rigour is already counted by the design and journal components.

The score is computed from the published data alone and is reproducible: the same file always yields the same numbers.

See the whole rubric drawn out → — four charts covering all 27,380 studies: how the scores are spread and where the cap bites, which of the 20 components the library is strong and weak on, which subjects rest on stronger evidence, and what kinds of study each subject is actually built from.

What this library is — and isn't

This is a large sample of the Alzheimer's literature, not an exhaustive index of it. It holds 27,380 records, built mostly from automated pulls of Europe PMC (60.6% of the library) and OpenAlex (18.6%), plus smaller pulls from PubMed, Crossref and medRxiv. If a study, a drug, or a finding isn't here, that is not evidence it doesn't exist in the literature — it may simply not have been pulled in yet.

1,032 records (3.8% of the library) are not peer-reviewed — 962 of those are preprints posted before any journal review, and the rest are conference abstracts, regulatory notices and reports. Every study card on this page states its status plainly, and the score above is capped for anything that isn't a peer-reviewed article.

See the full, machine-readable breakdown of this library's coverage →

Newest studies, as a dated timeline →    Atom feed