Margaret Flanagan, MD

At the forefront of dementia research, my role as a Tenured Full Professor encompasses leading the Nun Study of Aging and Alzheimer’s Disease. My expertise in neuropathology and neurodegeneration drives my mission to unravel the complexities of dementia, contributing to the development of innovative diagnostic and therapeutic strategies.

A central focus of my work is biomarker translation: connecting autopsy-confirmed neuropathology to what can be measured during life through neuroimaging and fluid based biomarkers (CSF, plasma). My group develops and validates cerebrospinal fluid and plasma biomarkers for Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias, and pairs antemortem MRI with quantitative, whole-slide digital histopathology to define what imaging signals represent at the tissue level. This work draws from my prior roles as Medical Director of a high-complexity CLIA-certified biomarker laboratory, Director of the Biggs Institute Brain Bank, and Lead of the South Texas Alzheimer’s Disease Research Center Neuropathology Core, experience that spans assay validation, regulatory oversight, biorepository governance, and standardized neuropathologic assessment across a large cohort. I also served as Chair of the national ADRC Neuropathology Core Steering Committee (2025–2026) and am a multiple principal investigator of the NINDS-funded Brain Digital Slide Archive.

With a tenure that extends over a decade in academic medicine and research, our team contributes to human neuropathology-based research and the elucidation of molecular mechanisms in the development of dementia, with the goal of turning tissue-level insight into biomarkers that are diagnostically useful and ready for validation in both clinical practice and clinical trial settings.