Dr. Sperling was a panelist for the Forum’s discussion on Drug Trials.
Reisa Sperling is a neurologist, specializing in dementia and imaging research. She is a Professor in Neurology at Harvard Medical School. She is also the Director of the Center for Alzheimer Research and Treatment at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, and the Director of the Neuroimaging Core and the Outreach Core of the Massachusetts Alzheimer’s Disease Research Center at Massachusetts General Hospital.
Dr. Sperling’s research is focused on the early diagnosis and treatment of Alzheimer’s disease. Her recent work involves the use of functional MRI and PET amyloid imaging to study alterations in brain function in aging and early Alzheimer’s disease. She is the Principal Investigator on multiple NIH and Foundation grants utilizing multi-modality imaging techniques to probe the neural correlates of memory changes in cognitive aging and early AD. She is the PI of the Harvard Aging Brain Study, funded by a NIA Program Project grant. Dr. Sperling oversees a number of clinical trials of potential disease-modifying therapeutics in early Alzheimer’s disease, and serves on the Steering Committees for the Alzheimer’s Disease Neuroimaging Initiative and the Dominantly Inherited Alzheimer Network. She has published over 120 peer-reviewed research articles on memory, aging, and early AD.
Dr. Sperling led the National Institute on Aging-Alzheimer’s Association working group to develop guidelines for the study of “Preclinical Alzheimer’s disease”. She serves as the Project Leader for the ADCS Anti-Amyloid Treatment in Asymptomatic AD–the “A4” trial, a 3 year secondary prevention trial in 1000 clinically normal older individuals with biomarker evidence of early AD pathology.
Dr. Sperling’s research is focused on the early diagnosis and treatment of Alzheimer’s disease. Her recent work involves the use of functional MRI and PET amyloid imaging to study alterations in brain function during in aging and early Alzheimer’s disease. She is the Principal Investigator on multiple NIH and Foundation grants to study the neural basis of memory impairment in MCI and AD, and the relationship of amyloid deposition to memory function.
Dr. Sperling has received the American Academy of the Neurology Clinical Research Fellowship Award, the Harvard Medical School Scholars in Medicine Fellowship, the Alzheimer’s Association Memory Ride Award, a Paul Beeson Faculty Scholars in Aging Award, and the 2007 American Academy of Neurology Research in Geriatric Neurology Award.
