PET Scans Reveal Elevated Tau in NFL Players’ Brains

A study hints that it might be possible to diagnose chronic traumatic encephalopathy, a neurodegenerative disease associated with frequent head injuries, while patients are still living.

Written byJef Akst

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Researchers have found that tau protein levels detected on brain scans of living people may serve as a biomarker of chronic traumatic encephalopathy, a brain disease that has been linked to repeated head trauma. Although years off, a diagnostic that uses such biomarkers could give patients a warning about the associated cognitive, mood, and behavioral issues they may endure, and perhaps give doctors a chance to levy interventions to ward off the symptoms of CTE, which is currently only able to be diagnosed by brain examinations postmortem.

In a study published Wednesday (April 10) in the New England Journal of Medicine, researchers at Boston University, a leader in CTE research, used positron emission tomography (PET) scans to assess levels of the tau protein in 26 living former NFL players who have started to experience cognitive difficulties and in 31 similarly aged male controls. They found that ...

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Meet the Author

Jef Akst
Jef (an unusual nickname for Jennifer) got her master’s degree from Indiana University in April 2009 studying the mating behavior of seahorses. After four years of diving off the Gulf Coast of Tampa and performing behavioral experiments at the Tennessee Aquarium in Chattanooga, she left research to pursue a career in science writing. As The Scientist's managing editor, Jef edited features and oversaw the production of the TS Digest and quarterly print magazine. In 2022, her feature on uterus transplantation earned first place in the trade category of the Awards for Excellence in Health Care Journalism. She is a member of the National Association of Science Writers.
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