More than 100 investigators seeking to unlock the mysteries of memory and the normal cognitive aging process met May 15-17 at the University of Florida McKnight Brain Institute in Gainesville for the McKnight Brain Research Foundation’s (MBRF) 15th Inter-Institutional Meeting.

Top brain health researchers, trainees and students from the four McKnight Brain Institutes established by the foundation — at the University of Florida, University of Arizona, University of Alabama at Birmingham and University of Miami — delved into the latest scientific advances in cognitive aging. The meeting aims to uncover interventions to optimize thinking, judgment and memory and preserve quality of life in advancing age.

The conference, which marked the 25th anniversary of the McKnight Brain Research Foundation, was a time to celebrate, assess progress and look to the future. Since its founding in 1999 by Evelyn F. McKnight, the MBRF, along with its partners, has funded more than $200 million in research specifically targeting cognitive aging, age-related cognitive decline and memory loss.

In addition to supporting translational research, a key goal of the MBRF is to educate the public and scientific community on normal cognitive aging, the non-disease process that affects all adults as they grow older and stands in sharp contrast to dementia caused by neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s disease.

“With all the research advances we’ve made over the last 25 years, we still don’t really understand how the brain works and how we form a memory. The brain is an amazing and mysterious organ and we’re still working to figure out how we catalog, retrieve, alter and re-file memories and all of the little places in the process that can break down. The more we learn about the brain and the memory process will help us better understand why some people do very well in the aging process and other people not as well, which is increasingly important in our aging society where more and more people aim to remain healthy and independent into their golden years.”

Michael L. Dockery, MD, Chair of the McKnight Brain Research Foundation

Jennifer Bizon, Ph.D., Director of UF’s McKnight Brain Institute, welcomed colleagues from Tucson, Birmingham and Miami back to Gainesville for the first time since 2019. The four partner institutes take turns hosting the Inter-Institutional Meeting.

“We’re all here because we share a commitment to improve brain health across the lifespan and to optimize wellbeing and preserve memory by leading the nation in cognitive aging research.”

 Jennifer Bizon, PhD, Director of the University of Florida’s McKnight Brain Institute

Read the full article on the UF MBI website.