Joshua G. Cahan M.D.

Guy holding posters of Indiana Jones captioned “Professors: Good; Nazis bad”

I made signs expressing points of disagreement with the government

Obviously I’m not recommending people take up smoking 🙄

Menthol cigarettes for AD? Surprisingly cholinergic effects of nicotine have a more established plausible mechanism. 🤓

When political theory catches up to neuroscience(re: PTSD, conditioning, empathy networks, psychopathy, just to start) political violence will have less support. Rage and trauma and desensitization multiply to disastrous end. Such cycles are hard to stop in individuals and societies alike.

He and Marshall Allen are still carrying the torch from a generation of musicians that still bring so much light to the world. To many more. ❤️ 🎂 🎈 🎷

Americans face biggest increase in health insurance costs in 15 years Rising premiums add to pressure on households already feeling the pinch from the high price of goods

US health insurers are raising insurance premiums by the most in 15 years.
Recall that Trump recently threatened 250% tariffs on pharmaceuticals. GOP lawmakers also chose not to extend the expanded premium tax credits that expire at the end of this year

At Northwestern Medicine, Super Agers are defined as people aged 80+ with delayed word recall raw scores at least equal to people 20-30 years younger. With 25 year follow-up, what do their brains looks like at post-mortem?
alz-journals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10....

The One Quality Most ‘Super-Agers’ Share

A nice write up on our longstanding Super Ager study, which helped to popularize the term, but more importantly, is yielding fascinating insights into resilience in aging.

www.nytimes.com/2025/08/07/w...

After feeling like garbage for the past week with the fluctuations in air quality, I never knew how acutely and profoundly poor air quality could impact my wellbeing. It is a new dystopian yearly phenomenon in Chicago. Still we are lucky here, more resilient to climate change than others.

RFK Jr. pulls $500 million in funding for vaccine development The Department of Health and Human Services plans to cancel contracts and pull funding for some vaccines being developed to fight respiratory viruses like COVID-19 and the flu.

“I don’t think I’ve seen a more dangerous decision in public health in my 50 years in the business,” said Mike Osterholm, a University of Minnesota expert on infectious diseases and pandemic preparations.”

A very nice interview with my colleague, Dr. Ian Grant, on the topic of GLP-1 inhibitors and dementia. It’s so rare that journalists publish long form interviews instead of talking points. Take a listen! @nmneurology.bsky.social @wgntv.com

wgnradio.com/john-landeck...

To describe those who fall pray to mass delusion, it’s no longer “drinking the kool aid” it is henceforth known as “drinking the orange juice”.

1/3 It's official, our grants from the NIH/NIEHS have all been suspended. We were aiming to understand how arsenic, a chemical that millions of Americans are exposed to at high levels, is disrupting the epigenetic machinery.

Henceforth my poor spelling, no longer a failing, shall be considered a tender mark of a genuine human creation. Evidence that no LLM was used in this writing. ✍️

First time in Canada and couldn’t imagine a better reason than for #AAIC2025! Find me during the conference walking around in my purple ISTAART Ambassador shirt or at my poster on Sunday. Drop by or reach out if you want to connect! 🍁🧠💜

Last year, our free 24/7 Helpline (800.272.3900) answered over 223,000 calls and online chats. This impact is possible because of YOU💜

See how you’re helping advance Alzheimer’s research, care, support and advocacy 👉 alz.org/about/our-impact #ENDALZ

He lived a public and courageous battle with Parkinson’s disease, other conditions. The fact that he performed so recently to a stadium of loving fans should be an inspiration to many with chronic illness. Rest in peace to the Prince of Darkness 🦇 ⚰️ 🎸 🤘

Finally: Ecologically valid MRI studies.

Seen at Max Planck Campus of Cognition #noai

Comic. [Person with ponytail using handheld device in front of a large sign with crooked, off-center header, with crooked QR code (with illegible URL) and crooked list beneath] Header: DOANATE TO FIX THIS SIGN! List: $10 Fix kerning [kerning around “rni” of kerning is difficult to read]; $20 Align Columns [out of alignment] $20 Fix text size [much smaller text size]; $50 Fix typo; $50 Fix centering; $100 fix rotation. PERSON: Grrr… [caption] My new company’s business model is based on extorting graphic designers.

Fix This Sign

xkcd.com/3113/

Make Subacute Sclerosing Panencephalitis Great Again! (MSSPEGA)

An important lesson for clinicians and caregivers, where you find the humanity you will find light. People with dementia have the same basic joys and fears as the rest of us. Humor, love, nostalgia, beauty are powerful tools.

I work as an elder and hospice caregiver, which I am oddly passionate about. I can love on them shamelessly and no one complains about my codependence. It's a win-win situation. Many of my caregiving colleagues complain about the repetitive questions and, sometimes reactions, of the elderly, especially when those patients happen to read the newspaper, especially with the current downward spiral of our country — as if these people haven't lived through enough horror... I love my dementia peeps, but sometimes wonder if there's a Guinness Book World Record for how many times an hour a dementia patient can repeat the same question — it's got to be in the hundreds. At least with small children, they ask different questions. Dementia patients will get stuck on one short question and ask it until you can interrupt their train(carousel) of thought and successfully redirect their attention. That carousel is pretty manic sometimes. A couple days ago, I picked up my mail from the post office and drove over to the nursing home to take (let's call her "Miss Daisy") Miss Daisy out for a drive. Before we took off on our road trip, to the end of The Road and back, in our landlocked little town (Juneau, Alaska), I set my copy of The Onion down in front of her. Over our two-hour excursion, tiny Miss Daisy read that front page at least a dozen times and each time she would snicker, giggle, and guffaw, then put it down on the dash board and, a minute later, discover it anew. I think it was the best afternoon of my life. We don't often hear them laugh and when they do, it's the sweetest thing you've ever heard. ... Thank you, thank you, thank you, for the really important work all of you do. You make the world a better place.

I got permission to share this, and I'm extremely grateful for that.

The Onion got this letter from one of our subscribers in Alaska. She works with dementia patients and decided to leave a copy in the car for each one.

This email made my year. Read it and you'll see what I mean. People are good.

Cholinergic feedback for modality- and context-specific modulation of sensory representations The brain’s ability to prioritize sensory information is crucial for adaptive behavior, yet its mechanisms remain unclear. We investigated basal forebrain cholinergic neurons modulating olfactory bulb...

Our new paper is out in Science.

We identified a subgroup of cholinergic neurons that mediate sensory modality-specific attention. They change their funcitonal properties within secs of behavioral context change.

Congrats to Bin for the great thesis, and the team!

www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

"But I am blown away by how much we have learned about Alzheimer’s over the last couple of years."—Bill Gates
www.statnews.com/2025/06/17/b...
"This is the moment to spend more money on research, not less."
Agree 💯
erictopol.substack.com/p/predicting...
erictopol.substack.com/p/the-breakt...

How Trump Blew Up Northwestern’s Business Model The federal government froze the university’s research funding. It hasn’t offered the school a way to get it back.

This is a good piece (gift link) on how the federal government ghosting Northwestern on congressionally-appropriated funding for three months is affecting the university...and will affect medical research more broadly.

🤏🤏🤏🤏🤏🤏🤏🤏🤏🤏🤏🤏🤏🤏🤏🤏 *squinting*

We had more people at the Lincoln Memorial for our Stand Up for Science rally on March 7th!

#StandUpforScience
#FailedBirthdayParade

yep! unpaywalled:

More complete analysis of NIH outlays (or lack thereof) from grant-watch.us

grant-watch.us/posts/trends...

I am profoundly grateful and humbled to be among the other inspiring researchers chosen for this award. The SAMBA: Study of Anti-amyloid Monoclonal antibodies and Biospecimens in ARIA aims to elucidate the mechanisms of potentially harmful side-effects of new AD treatment. Excited to get started!