Robyn Honea, PhD

Could brain scans measure improvement—not just decline? I'm excited to share our new study in Brain Imaging and Behavior, which found that improvements in brain health are associated with measurable changes in the brain's physical structure over time. For decades, brain imaging has focused on shrinkage, damage, and disease. Our research flips that narrative. Using advanced MRI techniques, we tracked adults over four years and found that positive changes in BrainHealth Index scores correlated with changes in cortical complexity—the folds, ridges, and architecture of the brain itself. The takeaway? The adult brain remains dynamic. It can adapt, reorganize, and optimize throughout life. Even more intriguing, men and women showed different structural pathways associated with brain health gains, highlighting the importance of precision approaches to brain optimization. This work adds to a growing body of evidence that brain health isn't fixed—and that positive change is possible across adulthood. It leverages a massive data set emerging from the ongoing longitudinal study, The BrainHealth Project. Grateful to my co-authors and BrainHealth Network collaborators at @CenterforBrainHealth, the @UniversityofKansasMedicalCenter, and @UCBerkeley for helping advance this important work: @AnkitPatel, @WilliamGuiler, @Mtdespo, @SandraBondChapman, @LoriG.Cook, @JeffreyS.Spence Link to the research publication in comments

My goal is to expand neuroimaging knowledge on this platform. My question to students and researchers alike: How can I help you overcome an obstacle you are facing with neuroimaging whether in the classroom or laboratory? I would be happy to start a series to do just that.