Brain HealthBrain MRI Muscle Scans Predict Dementia Risk Years Before Diagnosis
Researchers discovered that the temporalis muscle — a jaw muscle visible on standard brain MRI scans — contains hidden information about future dementia risk. Using deep learning and radiomic texture analysis, they extracted muscle characteristics from existing brain scans in over 1,200 dementia-free adults across two independent study cohorts. People with abnormal muscle texture patterns had 32–64% higher risk of developing dementia over follow-up, even after accounting for genetics, cognition, BMI, and physical performance. Muscle size also predicted dementia in one cohort. The finding suggests that muscle health reflects broader biological aging processes affecting the brain, and that clinicians could extract valuable prognostic data from MRIs patients are already receiving — at no additional cost or radiation exposure.
