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Letter of Welcome from the ADNI Principal Investigator
Welcome to the Home Page of the Alzheimer's Disease Neuroimaging Initiative.
The overall goal of this huge project is to define the rate of progress of mild cognitive impairment and Alzheimer's disease, to develop improved methods for clinical trials in this area, and to provide a large database which will improve design of treatment trials. We expect that this project will provide information and methods which will help lead to effective treatments for Alzheimer’s disease, leading to effective prevention.
This study is a large five year (we began on Oct 1 2004) research project to study the rate of change of cognition, function, brain structure and function, and biomarkers in 200 elderly controls, 400 subjects with mild cognitive impairment, and 200 with Alzheimer’s disease. There will be public access of the clinical and imaging data through this website and a parallel website at the Laboratory of Neuroimaging. Our project is funded for $60 million, with $40 million from the National Institute on Aging and National Institute of Bioimaging and Bioengineering, parts of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), and $20 million from the
Pharmaceutical Industry and
several foundations, donated to the Foundation for the NIH. The funds are awarded to the Northern California Institute for Research and Education , which is located at the Veterans Administration Medical Center, San Francisco, affiliated with the University of California San Francisco.
In 2010, funded by the federal stimulus package, the ADNI study will continue through “ADNI GO.” Building on the momentum of ADNI, ADNI GO will employ the standardized approach of other ADNI work. ADNI GO is the first study of its kind, focusing on participants who exhibit the very beginning stages of memory loss. Its 200 subjects with eMCI (early MCI) will help researchers more fully understand AD progression in its earliest stages. With better knowledge of the earliest stages of the disease, researchers may be able to test potential therapies at earlier stages, when they may have the greatest promise for slowing down progression of this devastating disease.
Our website has two sections:
First,
information for the general public interested in learning more about this project, and who may want to participate as volunteers. The second section contains information for scientists who want more technical information, or who wish to access our data bases. Scientists should go to the
"Scientist page”.
For those who have questions about this project, I strongly encourage you to read the various components of this website.
Individuals who wish to volunteer as participants can find appropriate contact information by clicking
here.
For scientists who want more information, they should read the
grant application (which is within the Scientist Section), and also read the
complete protocol and the procedures manuals for the Clinical, MRI, and PET cores.
For individuals who have additional questions about recruitment, contact
brainlink@ucsd.edu.
For investigators who have additional questions about the ADNI, they should contact myself or the relevant Core Leader. Contact information is provided within the Scientist Section.
For questions about this site please email
adcs-clinops@ucsd.edu.
Please let us know your suggestions for how we can increase the impact and success of ADNI.
Michael W. Weiner MD
Principal Investigator, Alzheimer's Disease Neuroimaging Initiative
Director, Center for Imaging of Neurodegenerative Disease
VA Medical Center (114M)
4150 Clement St., San Francisco Ca. 94121 USA
Professor of Medicine, Radiology, Psychiatry, and Neurology
University of California, San Francisco, U.S.A.
Web site for Dr Weiner's Laboratory
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