Director's Messages

September is Pain Awareness Month – an opportunity to reflect on our efforts to help the millions of Americans who suffer from chronic pain and to acknowledge that pain has cascading impacts on individuals, families, communities, and the nation. At the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS), in collaboration with our partners across the National Institutes of Health (NIH), our programs support research at all levels - from basic science to therapy development to clinical research.
Funding the highest quality science is a critically important element in advancing the mission of NINDS. Our Office of Research Quality leads NINDS’s efforts through workshop and meeting presentations, publications, and dissemination of research design and transparent reporting guidance and comprehensive educational tools. In May of this year, we brought together a group of de facto “Rigor Champions” for a two-day workshop to discuss how best to promote the principles of scientific rigor and transparency at research institutions.

Neurological disorders are the leading causes of disability worldwide.

June is Pride Month, and this month has been an important time to reflect on the neurological health and well-being of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex people and all others who fall under the queer umbrella (LGBTQI+). Approximately 11 million individuals identify as LGBTQI+ living in the United States in 2020. Our society, like LGBTQI+ individuals, is multidimensional, encompassing all races, ethnicities, religions, and social classes.
Some scientific problems exceed the capabilities of one or two laboratories, and therefore NINDS recognizes that interdisciplinary team science is essential to advancing our mission. By leveraging expertise and approaches across multiple disciplines, we can tackle the most ambitious goals and challenges in modern neuroscience research.
This month, we reach an important milestone in dementia research – the 10th anniversary of the National Plan to Address Alzheimer’s Disease, which stemmed from the National Alzheimer’s Project Act (NAPA). The National Plan was created with an ambitious vision: to prevent and effectively treat Alzheimer’s disease (AD) by 2025.

Each of us is born with a unique genome made up of DNA that we inherit, and changes to that DNA sequence occur in individual cells over our lifetimes.

Last week, we celebrated the most mysterious and fascinating organ in the body—the brain! —by participating in Brain Awareness Week, March 14-20.

The value of fundamental neuroscience cannot be overstated enough. Since the discoveries of Santiago Ramón y Cajal well over a century ago, basic neuroscience research has continuously advanced our understanding of the workings of the nervous system.

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