Funded Projects | Knight Initiative for Brain Resilience

This team will study the brains of individuals who lived past ninety with their cognitive function intact, using advanced tissue imaging and computer science to understand mechanisms of resilience that could slow neurodegeneration and preserve brain health.

This team aims to discover whether the brain’s endocannabinoid system is dysregulated during aging, triggering inflammation via molecules called prostaglandins. If so, a drug that decouples these systems might restore a youthful brain state and rescue cognitive function.

This team aims to define a network of genes that contribute to stress resistance in neurons and identify how it could be activated to enhance brain resilience and protect against neurodegenerative disease.

This team plans to map how age-related dysfunction of cellular waste disposal in lysosomes could lead to neurodegenerative diseases, potentially laying the foundation for a map of organelle function in the brain.

This team plans to study whether changes in neurons in the midbrain that regulate sleep, wakefulness, and immunity could contribute to aging and neurodegeneration. If successful, this information could rescue deficits in sleep and restore a normal immune profile.

This team proposes the first comprehensive study of how mitochondrial DNA is related to cognitive function and susceptibility to dementia in a diverse population of over 11,000 adults. The outcomes of this study will provide insight into possible racial disparities in brain health.

This team aims to better understand how Parkinson's disease attacks the brain's basic motor programs and to spawn novel therapies against the disease using gene-editing technology.

This team will explore the idea that neurotoxic protein aggregates seen in neurodegenerative disorders act at the synaptic connections between cells, and that resilience against these disorders may come from natural synapse-supporting factors that could be transformed into new forms of therapy.