OVERALL SUMMARY The focus of the Columbia University Center for Interdisciplinary Research on Alzheimer’s Disease Disparities (CIRAD) is biological, behavioral, sociocultural, and environmental mechanisms of ADRD disparities, including risk and resilience factors, biomarkers, and caregiving. The CIRAD will assemble a multidisciplinary team of investigators at the four schools of the Columbia University Medical Center including the Physicians and Surgeons, Nursing, Public Health and Dental Medicine, the Taub Institute for Research on Alzheimer’s Disease and Aging, the Columbia University Alzheimer’s Disease Research Center (CU-ADRC), the Gertrude H. Sergievsky Center, and the New York State Psychiatric Institute. Additionally, the CIRAD will have partnerships with the Mount Sinai School of Medicine ADRC, Weill Cornell Medical Center (WCMC), The Einstein Aging Study at Albert Einstein College of Medicine, Hebrew Home for the Aged at Riverdale (HHAR), the State University of New York – Downstate Medical Center and the City University of New York. The team includes experts in research in social determinants of health (SDOH), caregiving and dementia, mental health, physical health, stress, prevention, behavioral research, observational studies, clinical trials, bioinformatics and community- based participatory research. CIRAD will partner with community based organizations and members of the New York City community. The CIRAD team has access to tremendous resources for training in ADRD disparities research and career development activities that will be provided to the RCMAR Scientists before, during, and after their pilot studies are funded. The goal of CIRAD is to provide mentoring and career development, support for pilot studies, training in health disparities, and interdisciplinary collaboration to investigators from under-represented backgrounds who are pursuing ADRD research, and to support and accelerate research on the biological, behavioral, sociocultural, and environmental mechanisms of ADRD disparities so that they can be narrowed or eliminated.

NARRATIVE The Columbia Center for Interdisciplinary Research on Alzheimer's Disease Disparities will provide mentoring, training, pilot funding, and interdisciplinary collaboration to investigators from under-represented backgrounds in ADRD research, and will accelerate innovative research on the mechanisms of ADRD disparities.