Prof KVS Hari, director of the Centre for Brain Research at IISc Bengaluru, emphasized digital biomarkers for early detection and prevention of dementia. He noted that India's rapidly aging population makes dementia a major public health challenge. The centre focuses on data collection and AI to understand disease progression in the Indian context.
Prof KVS Hari, director of the Centre for Brain Research (CBR) at IISc Bengaluru, discussed dementia research in an interview with the Indian Express. Funded initially by a gift from the Pratiksha Trust of Infosys co-founder Kris Gopalakrishnan, CBR studies the aging brain and related disorders. Hari stated, 'By 2030, India will have around 340 million elderly, with roughly 7.4% affected by dementia.' In India, dementia is often dismissed as normal aging, receiving limited policy attention.
Dementia, encompassing Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, and vascular types, progresses 15-20 years before clinical diagnosis. Hari noted that despite decades of animal model research, no cure exists for Alzheimer's; the 2024-approved drug only delays onset by six to eight months. Thus, CBR focuses on human-derived early biomarkers using multimodal data, emphasizing lifestyle interventions like exercise, diet, and sleep.
Western drugs may not fully apply due to Indian genetics. In India, diabetes and hypertension onset a decade earlier, accelerating dementia. CBR launched an urban cohort in 2015 with 1,000 Bengaluru residents, involving annual assessments: clinical evaluations, blood samples, cognitive tests, MRI, OCT, audiometry, gait analysis, and more. A rural cohort in Kolar district started in 2018, targeting 10,000 participants with biennial follow-ups; first-round enrollment completed in February 2025.
Challenges include participant retention in longitudinal studies and building diverse datasets. Opportunities lie in non-pharmacological interventions, personalized lifestyle protocols, and digital tools like apps monitoring speech and gait. Blood-based plasma protein biomarkers and wearables enable continuous screening. Hari said, 'AI can detect patterns in multi-modal data that other methods miss.' Startups are developing speech-based diagnostics and portable low-field MRI. CBR is pushing for national cognitive data repositories to address fragmented health data.
