Research at the UAB Evelyn F. McKnight Brain Institute involves interdisciplinary collaborations across departments and programs at the University of Alabama at Birmingham and beyond, targeted at mitigating age-related cognitive decline and memory loss. This collective encompasses multiple disciplines - neurology, neurobiology, neuropsychology, psychology, psychiatry, exercise medicine, biology, along with gerontology, geriatrics and palliative care, behavioral neurobiology, , optometry, vision sciences, medical imaging, physiology, infectious diseases, biostatistics, and epidemiology. We also collaborate on research initiatives within the larger McKnight Brain Institute consortium that includes University of Florida, University of Arizona, and University of Miami.
Clinical and Population-Based Research
Our research focuses on healthy aging adults and adults with age-related memory and cognitive decline, stroke and other cerebrovascular conditions, cardiovascular disease, among others. Some of our research areas are: cognitive resilience and recovery in aging; cerebral hemodynamics; neurovascular disease; aging-related cognitive function; quality of life for the aging through research, education and clinical care; longitudinal data analysis; health disparities; cardiovascular disease; neuroscience; and clinical trials design and analysis. Additional topics include: visual cognition; neuroimaging; geriatrics and health care research; HIV/AIDS; epigenetics and cognition; and functional activity and decisional capacity.
Basic and Translational Science
Our basic and translational science research comprises studies on: molecular and organismal biology of aging; glial cell biology; regulation of short-term synaptic plasticity in the hippocampus; cell biology and systems neuroscience of vision and visual disorders; modulation of excitability in neocortical circuits, nicotinic receptors in CNS function; hormonal control of synaptic plasticity in aging; imaging approaches to investigating synaptic and glial cell function; mechanisms controlling dendritic spine morphology; cellular alterations of neural circuitry and molecular expression in psychiatric illnesses; neurodegeneration; PI-3-Kinase signal transduction in neuronal cell biology; inflammatory neuropathies; synaptic plasticity and function in the cerebellum; ubiquitin/proteasome system in neuronal function; neurogenetics; amyloid beta effects on neurons; and neurobiochemistry.