The Man Who Discovered Alzheimer's Disease During When Historically Dementia Was Less Understood

A montage of images of Alois Alzheimer, with brain scans. Aloysius "Alois" Alzheimer (1864-1915) was a German psychiatrist and neuropathologist and a colleague of Emil Kraepelin. In 1906, Alzheimer made a complete clinical and pathological description of presenile dementia, which came to be known as Alzheimer's disease, a progressive condition in which nerve cells in the brain degenerate. In 1901, Dr. Alzheimer observed a patient at the Frankfurt Asylum named Auguste Deter. The 51-year-old patient had strange behavioral symptoms, including a loss of short-term memory. This patient would become his obsession over the coming years. In April 1906, Mrs. Deter died and Alzheimer had the patient records and the brain brought to Munich where he was working at Kraepelin's lab. With two Italian physicians, he used the staining techniques to identify amyloid plaques and neurofibrillary tangles. © Jessica Wilson /Science Source