COSMIC: Cohort Studies of Memory in an International Consortium

COSMIC:

Cohort Studies of Memory in an International Consortium��—Combining data from population-based longitudinal cohorts studies to identify common risk factors for dementia and cognitive decline.

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New members: We encourage suitable cohort studies to join COSMIC, particularly those from under-represented regions or populations. Please see the membership criteria and contact information below.

Data use: Qualified researchers from anywhere in the world can apply to use COSMIC data via .

About COSMIC

Ageing is intricately connected with cognitive decline, and there is an increasing proportion of life lived with cognitive impairment as the lifespan increases. If an impact is to be made on this disability burden, we must understand the risk and protective factors for cognitive decline, frailty and chronic disease associated with ageing. The best approach is to study this using population-based ageing cohorts. A large number of such studies are ongoing internationally, and have identified a diverse range of factors, but there is considerable inconsistency in the results produced and the existing evidence needs further systematic examination. This also relates to the evidence for vascular risk factors as risk factors for Alzheimer’s Disease (AD). While many publications have previously argued for this, a recent review concluded that “at the present time, there is no consistent body of evidence to show that vascular risk factors increase AD pathology”.

Researchers of brain ageing from around the world come together in the COSMIC collaboration to determine what factors are common for cognitive decline and dementia in all human populations irrespective of race, ethnicity and socioeconomic development.

CHeBA Consortia

We argue that the way to deal with inconsistencies in the literature is to harmonise international studies so that data can be pooled and risk factors examined with greatly increased power. Accordingly, COSMIC (Cohort Studies of Memory in an International Consortium) has so far brought together 60 cohort studies of cognitive ageing from 38 countries across 6 continents, with a combined sample size of almost 186,000 individuals. The aim of the collaboration is to facilitate a better understanding of the determinants of cognitive ageing and neurocognitive disorders. This is being achieved by:

Harmonising shared, non-identifiable data from cohort studies that longitudinally examine change in cognitive function and the development of dementia in older individuals (60+ years).
Performing joint or mega-analyses using combined, harmonised data sets that yield collated results with enhanced statistical power, in addition to comparisons across diverse ethno-regional groups.

We believe COSMIC to be a unique endeavor, as other consortia with similar or related aims do not have the same level of international scope, or have a focus such as genomic epidemiology:��Ի��.

NIH Grant Helps Support COSMIC to Late 2028

In August 2023, Professor Perminder Sachdev, Co-Director of CHeBA and head of COSMIC, was awarded US$7.27 million over 5 years from the National Institute on Aging (NIA) of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), USA. ��This is in addition to a previous grant of US$2,57 million granted by the NIH in September 2017. The grants awarded allow further work in identifying risk and protective factors and biomarkers of cognitive ageing and dementia.

Investigators on the current grant include Professor Louisa Jorm, director of the 91ɫ��Ƭ Centre for Big Data Research in Health and CHeBA Co-Director Professor Henry Brodaty, as well as leading researchers from the USA (Professors Mary Ganguli, Richard Lipton), France (Dr. Maeleen Guerchet), Peru (Professor Jaime Miranda), India (Dr. Murali Krishna), UK (Professor Sarah Bauermeister) & Sweden (Professor Henrik Zetterberg).��

COSMIC Research Scientific Committee

The COSMIC Research Scientific Committee (RSC) is comprised of one leading researcher from each of the contributing studies:

Study	RSC member	Additional study leader

AGELESS	Maw Pin Tan	��
10/66 Cuba (Cuban Health and Alzheimer Study)	Juan J. Llibre-Rodriguez	��
10/66 Dominican Republic	Daisy Acosta	��
10/66 Mexico	Ana Luisa Sosa	��
10/66 Peru	Mariella Guerra Arteaga	��
10/66 Puerto Rico	Ivonne Z. Jimenez-Velazquez	��
10/66 Venezuela	Aquiles Salas	��
Atma Jaya Cognitive & Aging Research (ACtive Aging Research)	Yuda Turana	��
The Atahualpa Project	Oscar H. Del Brutto	��
Bambui Cohort Study of Aging	Erico Costa	��
Boston Puerto Rican Health Study	Sabrina Noel	��
Canadian Study of Health & Aging (CSHA)	Kenneth Rockwood	��
Chinese Longitudinal Aging Study (CLAS)	Xiao Shifu	��
Cognitive Function and Ageing Studies (CFAS)	Carol Brayne	��
Einstein Aging Study (EAS)	Richard Lipton	Mindy J Katz
Epidemiology of Dementia in Central Africa (EPIDEMCA)	Maëlenn Guerchet	Pierre-Marie Preux
EpiFloripa Aging Study	Eleonora d’Orsi	��
Etude Santé Psychologique Prévalence Risques et Traitement (ESPRIT)	Karen Ritchie	Marie-Laure Ancelin
Faroese Septuagenarian Cohort	Maria Skaalum Petersen	��
Framingham Heart Study (FHS)	Rhoda Au	��
Gothenburg H70 Birth Cohort Studies	Ingmar Skoog	��
Hellenic Longitudinal Investigation of Aging and Diet (HELIAD)	Nikolaos Scarmeas	��
Hisayama Study	Toshiharu Ninimiya	��
Hong Kong Memory and Ageing Prospective Study (HK-MAPS)	Linda Lam	��
Ibadan Study of Ageing (ISA)	Oye Gureje	��
Identification and Intervention for Dementia in Elderly Africans (IDEA) Study	Stella-Maria Paddick	Richard Walker
I-Lan Longitudinal Aging Study (ILAS)	Liang-Kung Chen	��
IMIAS (International Mobility in Aging Study)	Mohammad Auais	Ricardo Oliveira Guerra
Indianapolis Ibadan Dementia Project	Hugh Hendrie	��
Invecchiamento Cerebrale in Abbiategrasso (Invece.Ab)	Elena Rolandi��	��
The Irish Longitudinal Study on Ageing (TILDA)	Ann Hever��	Rose Anne Kenny
KLOSCAD (Korean Longitudinal Study on Cognitive Aging and Dementia)	Ki-Woong Kim	��
Kurihara Project	Kenichi Meguro	��
Leiden 85-plus study	Jacobijn Gussekloo	��
Leipzig Longitudinal Study of the Aged (LEILA75+)	Steffi Riedel-Heller	��
LRGS TUA: Neuroprotective Model for Healthy Longevity among Malaysian Older Adults	Suzana Shahar	��

Maastricht Aging Study (MAAS)	Sebastian Koehler	Kay Deckers
Marikina Memory and Aging Project (MMAP)	Jacqueline Dominguez	��
Monongahela-Youghiogheny Healthy Aging Team (MYHAT)	Mary Ganguli	��
MYNAH (MYsore studies of Natal effects on Ageing and Health)	Murali Krishna	��
Neuroepidemiology of cognitive impairment in adults from marginal urban areas: a door-to-door population study in the Puente Piedra district, Lima, Perú	Nilton Custodio	��
Northern Ireland Cohort for the Longitudinal Study of Ageing (NICOLA)	Bernadette McGuinness	Frank Kee
Personality & Total Health (PATH) Through Life project	Kaarin Anstey	��
Puerto Rican Elderly: Health Conditions Study (PREHCO)	Michael Crowe	��
Sacramento Area Latino Study on Aging (SALSA)	Allison Aiello	��
Sasaguri Genkimon Study	Kenji Narazaki	��
Shanghai Aging Study (SAS)	Ding Ding	��

Singapore Longitudinal Ageing Studies (SLAS I & II)	Roger Ho	��
São Paulo Ageing & Health Study (SPAH)	Marcia Scazufca	��
Sydney Memory & Ageing Study (MAS)	Henry Brodaty	Perminder Sachdev
Taiwan Initiative for Geriatric Epidemiological Research (TIGER)	Yen-Ching Chen	Jen-Hau Chen
Tajiri Project	Kenichi Meguro	��
Ugandan study	Vincent Mubangizi	��
Vallecas Project	Pascual Sanchez-Juan	��
Washington Heights Inwood and Columbia Aging Project (WHICAP)	Richard Mayeux	Nicole Schupf
Whitehall II	Mika Kivimaki	��
ZARADEMP Project	Antonio Lobo	��

Perminder Sachdev: Scientia Professor of Neuropsychiatry; Co-Director, Centre for Healthy Brain Ageing (CHeBA), 91ɫ��Ƭ Sydney; Director, Neuropsychiatric Institute, Prince of Wales Hospital, Sydney, Australia;��
Richard Lipton: Edwin S. Lowe Professor and Vice Chair of Neurology, Albert Einstein College of Medicine;
Henry Brodaty: Scientia Professor of Ageing & Mental Health; Co-Director, Centre for Healthy Brain Ageing (CHeBA), 91ɫ��Ƭ Sydney; Director, Dementia Collaborative Research Centre (DCRC); Senior Consultant, Old Age Psychiatry, Prince of Wales Hospital;
Louisa Jorm: Director, Centre for Big Data Research in Health and Professor, Faculty of Medicine, 91ɫ��Ƭ Sydney, Australia;
Maëlenn Guerchet: Senior Researcher, Institut de Recherche pour le Developpement, France
Sarah Bauermeister: Associate Professor of Cognitive Neuropsychology, Department of Psychiatry, University of Oxford; Senior Scientist and Senior Data Manager, Dementias Platform UK (DPUK)
Henrik Zetterberg: Professor of Neurochemistry & Department Head, Psychiatry and Neurochemistry, University of Gothenburg, Sweden;
Ester Cerin: Professor & Program Leader, Behaviour, Environment and Cognition Research Program, Australian Catholic University Limited, Australia;
Jaime Miranda: Research Professor at the Department of Medicine, School of Medicine, Universidad Peruana Cayetano Heredia, Peru;
Mary Ganguli: Professor of Psychiatry, Neurology, and Epidemiology, University of Pittsburgh, USA;��
Murali Krishna: Senior Research Fellow, Centre for Mental Health and Society, University of Bangor, India;
Wei Wen: Associate Professor, Centre for Healthy Brain Ageing (CHeBA), 91ɫ��Ƭ Sydney, Australia;
Vibeke Catts: Postdoctoral Fellow, Research Manager, Centre for Healthy Brain Ageing (CHeBA), 91ɫ��Ƭ Sydney, Australia;
Mindy Katz: Senior Associate, The Saul R. Korey Department of Neurology, Albert Einstein College of Medicine, USA;
John Crawford: Senior Research Officer, Centre for Healthy Brain Ageing (CHeBA), 91ɫ��Ƭ Sydney, Australia;
Nicole Kochan: Senior Research Fellow, Centre for Healthy Brain Ageing (CHeBA), 91ɫ��Ƭ Sydney, Australia;
Louise Mewton: Associate Professor and Program Lead in Lifespan and Brain Health Research at the Matilda Centre, University of Sydney, Australia;
Thomas Karikari: Assistant Professor of Psychiatry, University of Pittsburgh, USA;
Anbupalam Thalamuthu, Senior Research Fellow, Centre for Healthy Brain Ageing (CHeBA), 91ɫ��Ƭ Sydney, Australia;
Karen Mather, Senior Research Fellow, Centre for Healthy Brain Ageing (CHeBA), 91ɫ��Ƭ Sydney, Australia.��

COSMIC Publications

No.	Publication	Free PMC Article
1		PMC3827845
2		PMC4634954
3		PMC5360220
4	Jang et al. Differential effects of completed and incomplete pregnancies on the risk of Alzheimer disease. Neurology. 2018;91(7):e643-e651. Neurology. 2018;91(7):e643-e651 (PFD). DOI:10.1212/WNL.0000000000006000. PMID:30021919. PMC9811944	PMC9811944
5		PMC6483891
6		PMC6650056
7		PMC6985182
8		PMC7519881
9		PMC7518559
10		PMC7724926
11		PMC7406389
12		PMC7666102
13	Bae et al. Parity and the risk of incident dementia: a COSMIC collaboration cohort study. Epidemiol Psychiatr Sci. 2020 Oct 20;29:e176. DOI: 10.1017/S2045796020000876. PMID:33077022. PMC7681107	PMC7681107
14		PMC7749505
15		PMC8748312
16	Wu et al. Dose-response relationship between late-life physical activity and incident dementia: a pooled analysis of 10 cohort studies of memory in an international consortium. Physical activity and cognitive decline in older adults. Alzheimers Dement. 2022 Mar 15. doi: 10.1002/alz.12628. Online ahead of print. DOI: 10.1002/alz.12628. PMID: 35290713. PMC9652610��	PMC9652610
17	Mewton et al. The relationship between alcohol use and dementia in adults aged over 60 years: A combined analysis of prospective, individual-participant data from 15 international studies. Addiction. 2023;118(3):412-424. doi: 10.1111/add.16035. PMID: 35993434. PMC9898084	PMC9898084
18	Samtani et al. Associations between social connections and cognition: a global collaborative individual participant data meta-analysis. Lancet Healthy Longev. 2022 Nov;3(11):e740-e753. DOI: 10.1016/S2666-7568(22)00199-4. Epub 2022 Oct 20. PMID: 36273484. PMC9750173	PMC9750173
19	Gong et al. Sex differences in dementia risk and risk factors: individual-participant data analysis using 21 cohorts across six continents from the COSMIC consortium. Alzheimers Dement. 2023;19(8):3365-3378. DOI: 10.1002/alz.12962. PMID:36790027. PMC10955774	PMC10955774
20	Lipnicki et al. Harmonizing ethno-regionally diverse datasets to advance the global epidemiology of dementia. Clin Geriatr Med. 2023 February ; 39(1): 177–190. DOI:10.1016/j.cger.2022.07.009. PMID: 36404030. PMC: 9767705	PMC9767705
21	Mahalingam, Samtani et al. Social connections and risk of incident mild cognitive impairment, dementia and mortality in 13 longitudinal cohort studies of ageing. Alzheimers Dement. 2023;19(11):5114-5128. DOI: 10.1002/alz.13072. PMID:37102417. PMC10603208	PMC10603208
22	Sprague et al. Correlates of gait speed among older adults from six countries: Findings from the COSMIC collaboration. J Gerontol A Biol Sci Med Sci. 2023;78(12):2396-2406.	PMC10692426
23	Oh et al. Parental History of Dementia and the Risk of Dementia: A cross-sectional analysis of a global collaborative study. Psychiatry and Clinical Neurosciences 2023 Aug;77(8):449-456.	PMC10524874
24	Lennon et al. Use of Antihypertensives, Blood Pressure, and Estimated Risk of Dementia in Late -Life: An Individual Participant Data Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis. JAMA Netw Open. 2023 Sep 5;6(9):e2333353. DOI:10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2023.33353. PMID: 37698858. PMC10498335	PMC10498335
25	Lin et al. Risk factors and cognitive correlates of white matter hyperintensities in ethnically diverse populations without dementia: the COSMIC consortium. Alzheimer's & Dementia: Diagnosis, Assessment & Disease Monitoring (accepted 2024 Feb 2).	PMC10937819
26	Van Asbroeck et al. Lifestyle and incident dementia: A COSMIC individual participant data meta‐analysis. Alzheimers Dement. 2024 Apr 27.	PMC38676366
27		39308753
28		39356504
29	Matison, et al. Associations between fruit and vegetable intakes and incident depression in middle-aged and older adults from 10 diverse international longitudinal cohorts. J Affect Disord. 2024 Aug 15;359:373-381. PMID: 38788860	PMID 38788860
30		PMC11329294
31	Samtani S, et al. Emotional and instrumental social support and older adults' depressive symptoms: collaborative individual participant data meta-analysis of 11 population-based studies of aging. Cohort Studies of Memory in an International Consortium (COSMIC). Am J Epidemiol. 2025 Oct 7;194(10):3041-3049. DOI: 10.1093/aje/kwaf137��	PMID:��40643376
32	Lipnicki DM et al. Addressing global diversity in dementia research with the COSMIC collaboration. Neuroscience. 2025 Aug 30;582:180-194. DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroscience.2025.07.036��. Epub 2025 Jul 24. PMID:��40714148��	PMID:��40714148��

Current Projects

Project aim	Lead	Affiliation
Associations of cardiovascular-kidney-metabolic syndrome with cognitive decline and dementia��	X Xu	Zhejiang University
Association of type 2 diabetes and prediabetes with post-stroke cognitive decline	J Lo	CHeBA 91ɫ��Ƭ
Associations of olfactory function and snoring with cognition and dementia��	R Shi	National Taiwan University
Education, educational complexity, socioeconomic status and incident dementia��	A Matison	CHeBA 91ɫ��Ƭ
Clinical and sociodemographic pathways linking hearing loss and dementia	R Chander	CHeBA 91ɫ��Ƭ
Alcohol, cognition, and mortality	L Mewton	91ɫ��Ƭ, Sydney
Antihypertensives, blood pressure, and dementia risk	M Lennon	91ɫ��Ƭ, Sydney
Social support and depressive symptoms	S Samtani	91ɫ��Ƭ, Sydney
Sleep, MCI, and dementia	S Wan Suh	Seoul National University
Nutrition & cognitive health	C Anastasiou	Harokopio University, Athens
Risk models for prediction of dementia in LMICs	E Pakpahan	Northumbria University, UK
Maximizing dementia risk reduction	K Deckers	Maastricht University
Global burden of dementia	L Mewton	91ɫ��Ƭ, Sydney
Diet and depression	A Matison	91ɫ��Ƭ, Sydney
Cognitive decline before and after stroke	J Lo	91ɫ��Ƭ, Sydney
Heart and brain health: AI assisted dementia risk models	B Stephan	Curtin University, Australia
Sex-specific risks for MCI and dementia	C Wang	Albert Einstein College of Medicine, New York
Cardiometabolic multimorbidity, depression, and dementia	X Xu	Zhejiang University, Hangzhou
Social health and cognitive health trajectories	L Braas	Radboud University, The Netherlands
Nightmares, cognitive decline and dementia	D Lipnicki	91ɫ��Ƭ, Sydney
ENIGMA group harmonization of cognitive domain scores	E Dennis	University of Utah
Neuropsychiatric symptoms and dementia risk	DJ Oh	Kangbuk Samsung Hospital, Seoul
Cerebrovascular burden in vascular cognitive impairment	N Husein	91ɫ��Ƭ, Sydney
Polygenic risk scores and dementia	K Mather	91ɫ��Ƭ, Sydney
Polygenic risk scores and dementia	A Thalamuthu	91ɫ��Ƭ, Sydney
Predicting dementia risk in LMICs with machine learning	J Jiang	91ɫ��Ƭ, Sydney
Climate factors and dementia risk	D Ding	Fudan University, Shanghai
Illiteracy, gender, and dementia risk	DJ Oh	Kangbuk Samsung Hospital, Seoul
Physical activity, traumatic brain injury, and cognitive outcomes	B Tari	University of Oxford, UK

Project aim Lead Affiliation
Grip strength and cognition YH Su National Taiwan University
Pet ownership, social health and cognition S Samtani 91ɫ��Ƭ, Sydney

Project aim	Lead	Affiliation
Grip strength and cognition	YH Su	National Taiwan University
Pet ownership, social health and cognition	S Samtani	91ɫ��Ƭ, Sydney

COSMIC welcomes research proposals from member studies, and from outside investigators wishing to utilise the wealth and diversity of data held by the COSMIC cohorts. All proposals will be reviewed by the COSMIC Scientific Steering Committee, and should be submitted via the Dementias Platform Australia website using the link below:

Please note that COSMIC member studies are not committed to providing data for all projects and elect to participate on a project-by-project basis. It is a requirement that any publication using a study’s data involve consultation with the study leader and include them and other members as co-authors.

Also note that proposals from outside investigators require sponsorship by a lead investigator of a COSMIC member study. Details of the member studies and contact details of the lead investigators can be found on this website, and it may be appropriate to seek sponsorship from the leader of a study that has investigated similar issues or holds particularly relevant data.

For any enquiries, contact��Darren Lipnicki.��d.lipnicki@unsw.edu

Dementias Platform UK (DPUK) and Dementias Platform Australia (DPAU)

Dementias Platform UK (DPUK;��) offers researchers dementia-optimised cohort data from more than 50 population and clinical cohort studies, comprising records for over 3.5 million people. In partnership with DPUK, CHeBA has launched Dementias Platform Australia (DPAU;��). DPAU will complement DPUK and other satellite dementias platforms, and allow access to research data from multiple dementia studies carried out in Australia, the Asia-Pacific region and beyond to all six continents. The close partnership between DPUK and DPAU enables a sharing of technical assets and best practice, and will facilitate international data analysis. COSMIC studies will be the first to upload data to DPAU in 2022.

Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) at the University of Washington

Coordinated through the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) at the University of Washington, the Global Burden of Disease (GBD;��) study provides consistent and comparative descriptions of the major causes of mortality and morbidity for over 350 diseases and injuries. GBD estimates are regularly updated to ensure the most complete and highly comparable set of estimates possible. In partnership with the IHME, COSMIC studies are providing data to inform global dementia estimates. This includes data from countries previously under-represented in GBD estimates (e.g., Cuba, Tanzania and Malaysia). By providing new data COSMIC will help to produce more accurate estimations of the global burden of disease associated with dementia.

Davos Alzheimer’s Collaborative (DAC)

The Davos Alzheimer’s Collaborative (DAC;��) is “uniting leading organizations worldwide to build an innovation ecosystem that will accelerate breakthroughs, develop and scale promising solutions and equip every healthcare system to end Alzheimer's disease everywhere.” Through its Global Cohort Development program (), DAC is building global cohorts to advance understanding of Alzheimer’s disease among diverse populations. COSMIC cohorts from regions including the Philippines, Malaysia and Singapore are among the first participants in this program, and are receiving resources from DAC to obtain new digital phenotyping and blood-based genetic and biomarker data. These data will be made available via the Alzheimer’s Disease Data Initiative (ADDI) platform () as well as DPAU.

COSMIC Membership Criteria

Studies are eligible to participate in COSMIC if they meet the following membership criteria:

Are epidemiological, and therefore population-based.
Have a minimum sample size of 500.
Examine individuals aged 60 years and over.
Are longitudinal, with a minimum of two assessments.
Include assessment of cognitive function as an important, if not central, objective.
The outcome measures include dementia and/or cognitive impairment and/or cognitive decline.
Studies from Africa, South America and Eastern Europe are particularly encouraged to join.