Researchers study links between retinal appearance, Alzheimer’s

Researchers at Washington University in St. Louis will study links between the retina and Alzheimer's disease.

Four years after researchers at Washington University in St. Louis detected a possible link between risk for Alzheimer’s disease and the appearance of the eye’s retina, the National Institute on Aging of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) is expanding the effort to understand that connection with a $10.3 million grant to continue their work.

According to a university news release, Gregory P. Van Stavern, MD, a professor of ophthalmology and visual sciences and the senior author of the paper published in 2018 that identified the possible connection, is the principal investigator at the St. Louis study site.

Cyrus Raji, MD, an assistant professor of radiology and of neurology, is the leader of the study’s brain imaging core.

The university also noted that it also will be a clinical center in the study.

Jessica Alber, PhD, an assistant professor of biomedical and pharmaceutical sciences at the George & Anne Ryan Institute for Neuroscience at the University of Rhode Island, is the study’s principal investigator.