About 1 in 9 Americans older than 65 have Alzheimer's Disease, the most common form of dementia. Population health experts predict that the number of people diagnosed with dementia will nearly double by 2050. Medical researchers are urgently seeking solutions and potential therapies to stop the onset of dementia, but its root causes are still not well understood. For decades, researchers have investigated the buildup of two proteins, tau and amyloid-beta, detected in post-mortem brains of people with Alzheimer's disease. Therapies targeting the dysfunction in these proteins have shown minimal benefits to patients suffering cognitive decline.

So Jackson Laboratory scientist Dr. Alaina Reagan started looking elsewhere for answers - specifically in the system she knew best. Alaina studies the cerebrovascular system and how a person's genetics may dictate how blood circulates and flows to the brain. In this episode, she discusses a crucial lab study that established a link between the MTHFR gene variant in 40% of the world's population and blood vessel damage. In a refreshing take on genetic science, Alaina explains how the variant influences the mechanics of blood flow but isn't the singular cause of dementia. She explains how keeping our minds active could help offset the deficiency associated with this one-letter misprint in our genetic code.

Mia: Emerging science has linked Alzheimer’s and related dementias to variations in our behavior within specific types of cells in the human genome. But Dr. Alaina Reagan’s research addresses a neglected possible culprit: cerebrovascular cells, or the cells that dictate how blood flows to the brain. So in this episode, we again look under a microscope to understand how variations in our genes could reveal early risk of dementia and inform the development of therapies to treat and prevent cognitive decline.

For information about the Howell Lab and Jackson Laboratories, visit: https://www.jax.org/research-and-faculty/research-labs/the-howell-lab

While writing a book on how human civilizations have historically depleted farm soil nutrients with dire consequences, geologist David Montgomery watched his wife, Anne, revive their backyard's “crap” dirt. Through persistence, composting, and trusting natural processes, Anne nourished once hopeless soil back to health, and her garden has flourished ever since.

Combining David's geological knowledge with Anne's biological expertise, the couple launched the Dig2Grow movement and conducted the first national study comparing the nutrient density of crops and livestock raised on side-by-side regenerative and conventional farms. In this episode, Dr. Anne Biklé and Dr. David Montgomery discuss their findings, explain the link between soil health and human well-being, and make the case for why everyone should care about the dirt that grows their food.

To learn more about Dig2Grow, visit: https://www.dig2grow.com/

Order What Your Food Ate, the book that this research was developed for, here: https://bit.ly/4xziF8N

Music licensed through Soundstripe.

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Dr. Jennifer J. Carroll heard the same story in her interviews with people who overdosed on opioids and were being treated in emergency departments: their supplier was arrested.

In Episode 6, Dr. Jennifer J. Carroll discusses research measuring the relationship between police drug seizures and drug overdoses in the city of Indianapolis. Using police records of overdose and public records of overdose, the researchers predicted the chance of an overdose within mere meters and days of a police raid. Understanding this association and the threat of drug supply disruptions helps us rethink the most effective approaches to drug enforcement and preventing death from drug overdose in communities across the U.S.

Read the paper published in the American Journal of Public Health: https://ajph.aphapublications.org/doi/full/10.2105/AJPH.2023.307291

Read the CDC guidance document, Evidence-Based Strategies for Preventing Opioid Overdose: What’s Working in the United States, co-authored by Jennifer Carroll: https://www.cdc.gov/overdose-prevention/media/pdfs/2018-evidence-based-strategies.pdf

Learn more about evidence-based strategies for overdose prevention here: https://www.naco.org/program/opioid-solutions-center