Neuropathology Core

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1. SUMMARY (Neuropathology Core) The Neuropathology Core supports the vision of the Stanford Alzheimer’s Disease Center (ADRC) to serve as a shared resource to facilitate and enhance multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary research in Alzheimer’s disease (AD) and related disorders. The Core is structured to continue its track record of enabling and applying innovative cutting-edge technologies with emphasis on brain aging and the diversity of pathologic processes that underlie cognitive impairment and dementia caused by AD and related diseases. The critical functions of the Neuropathology Core include diagnostic expertise, serving as a biorepository, facilitating innovation, and training. Over the past five years, the Neuropathology Core has completed over 50 research brain autopsies and held a leadership position in setting and evaluating national research guidelines for neuropathologic evaluation of AD. We have banked over 800 tissue specimens, contributed data and biospecimens to local, regional, national, and international research studies and consortia, and fostered development and implementation of innovative technologies in translational research. Through the Core, we trained clinicians and scientists from different disciplines in neuropathology and the molecular pathology of dementia-related neurodegenerative diseases. The Neuropathology Core will pursue its mission through four Specific Aims. The Core will provide comprehensive neuropathologic evaluations for physicians and researchers with timely and comprehensive autopsy reports that describe the neuropathologic features of AD and related diseases according to the most current guidelines and consensus diagnostic criteria. It will maintain and continue to grow its highly accessible, but appropriately safeguarded, repository of brain tissue and biospecimens from carefully and longitudinally characterized patients with cognitive impairment or dementia, as well as cognitively normal individuals, using methods that increase and maximize tissue and data quality. In doing so, the Core will empower innovative high-content imaging approaches for both formalin-fixed, paraffin-embedded tissue and for frozen brain regions to maximize the research value of the Stanford ADRC repository and other brain banks around the country. Finally, we will maintain a rich training environment for medical and graduate students, residents, fellows, and junior faculty across departments to teach concepts and state-of-the-art techniques that advance current interdisciplinary research and foster future advances and insights in brain aging and neurodegeneration. The Core is organized to maximize integration with all other Cores in the Stanford ADRC. It also will continue to serve as a hub of support for affiliated ADRCs and independent research awards through diagnostic practices, molecular assays, and tissue sharing. In doing so, the Core and Center will continue to contribute nationally to advance our understanding of the pathologic features and pathophysiologic processes of brain aging, all stages of AD, and related dementias.