An expanded database of resources on aging, dementia, and traumatic brain injury (TBI) is available for researchers and the public thanks to a collaboration between the Allen Institute for Brain Science, UW Pathology and Internal Medicine, and Group Health.
According to an article on The Daily (University of Washington) website, the database can be used to understand the aging process and identify the impact of traumatic brain injury later in life.
“Researchers at the Allen Institute analyzed brain tissue using transcriptomics, which measures gene activity in tissues through RNA sequencing, and images of disease states are available on the online resource,” the article reads. “Coupled with mental health histories and clinical diagnoses, this database provides a holistic view of the brain.”
The Allen Institute is committed to open-access, and the website includes a data visualization feature that can be used to look at relationships between data sets, such as the variability of genes. Since the data is available online, community members can explore potential relationships across the data, and researchers can download data for future tests.
The project started with a question about the long-term effects of traumatic brain injury on an aged brain, particularly related to the onset of dementia, according to the article.
“The brain data on the website comes from the Adult Changes in Thought Study, led by researchers Eric Larson and Paul Crane at the Group Health Research Institute and the UW,” the article reads. “The data set includes a random set of patients from the research institute and their medical and health history.”
Although the researchers focused on TBI, the collected data will also be used to study diseases such as chronic traumatic encephalopathy, a degenerative brain disease that results from a history of trauma, and chronic vascular brain injury , which are small strokes that can cause dementia.
The online application for the brain map can sort based on the traits that interest the user. It creates a visual model for the relationships between variables performing complex modeling or analyses. If users want to explore a relationship between variables, they can email the principal investigators.
Main Office Location
Rozek Law Offices, SC
3970 N Oakland Ave Ste 604
Milwaukee, Wisconsin 53211
Additional Client Meeting Location
Rozek Law Offices - Madison
2810 Crossroads Dr Ste 4046
Madison, Wisconsin 53718