MRI scans, APOE4, and Alzheimer Disease

So a break from that PTEN that I haven't gotten to yet, to comment briefly on APOE4 in Alzheimer Disease. I found this research from Washington University in St. Louis that uses functional MRI to image people with an APOE4 mutation that do not have plaque formation. APOE4 increases the risk of Alzheimer disease dramatically, but even so, not everyone gets it. http://news.wustl.edu/news/Pages/21633.aspx

this is the link. Interesting that the area that is most affected by decrease is the right temporal lobe. I have to review my exact neuroanatomy, but seizures in the right temporal lobe are associated with religious visions. Would then increased religious activity act to prevent Alzheimer disease? Is there a behavioral phenotype to Alzheimer disease?

My mother, one of the most religious people I know, and self-sacrificing people I know, had a CT scan of her head shortly before she died. There wasn't even the "normal" decay of aging--she had the brain of a much younger person. Maybe I should volunteer our family for study....