Univ. of Delaware Alzheimer's research gets boost from new grant funding

By Isreal Hale

Published September 19, 2025 at 8:20 AM EDT

Kinesiology and Applied Physiology (KAAP) Associate Professor and DECCAR Director Chris Martens (white checked shirt/tan pants) and Associate Professor of Biomedical Engineering Curtis Johnson, an executive committee member with DECCAR (charcoal jacket/jeans) work along with help from doctoral students Nate Romberger (CHS) and Mary Kramer (gray fleece sweater)

The Delaware Community Foundation this week announced a five-year, $13.1 million dollar grant to the Delaware Center for Cognitive Aging Research.

The money will help further the center’s research by expanding the number of participants in clinical studies, creating new forms of testing to find biomarkers which predict Alzheimer's development, and fund the purchase of an MRI machine - a critical tool for the diagnosis of cognitive aging.

Earlier this week, Delaware Center for Cognitive Aging Research director Dr. Christopher Martens joined Delaware Public Media’s Isreal Hale to explore what this financial boost means for their research.

DPM’s Isreal Hale interviews Delaware Center for Cognitive Aging Research director Dr. Christopher Martens

The Delaware Community Foundation announced a $13.1 million grant to The Delaware Center for Cognitive Aging Research this week

The Center’s director Dr. Christopher Marten says the new funding will vastly improve the scope and quality of their research, noting some improvements will be seen immediately.

Delaware Center for Cognitive Aging Research director Dr. Christopher Martens

“Because this is partially funding the continuance of our DelSAP study, we’ve already enrolled participants in that study over the past year. So, people who were enrolled over this past year are now eligible to come in for follow up visits and we can continue to enroll more participants.” he told DPM.

The DelSAP study “examines the relationship between health, lifestyle, and dementia risk” according to the Center, and Martens says scaling up the number of participants is important. The funding will help build on the initial work in part by helping expand the participant pool from 100 to 500.

That study was originally funded by a $575,000 donation from DCF in 2023, and Martens says DCCAR was then invited to apply again following its success.

“And then we went back to them this year and were able to share some of the results and share some of our long-term vision for growing the center and then work on a proposal for what it would take to really build the critical capacity for our longitudinal study the way that we envision it.” he said.

The funding - spread over 5 years - marks the largest ever investment into Alzheimer's disease research in Delaware according to the DCF.

Martens says this money is the result of a legacy gift by the late Paul H. Boerger; DCF President and CEO Stuart Comstock-Gay noted “his foresight will help so many."

The new funding will also help expand the number of researchers that can do work at the Center and allow for the purchase of an MRI machine crucial to the diagnosis of cognitive aging related illnesses.