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When researchers at the University of Kentucky compare brains donated from people who died with dementia, very rarely do they find one that bears only Alzheimer's trademark plaques and tangles — no other damage. If they do, "we call it a unicorn," said Donna Wilcock, an Alzheimer's specialist at the university's aging center. Contrary to popular perception, "there are a lot of changes that happen in the aging brain that lead to dementia in addition to plaques and tangles." (Neergaard, 9/10)

The National Institute on Aging has awarded a five-year grant worth up to $53.4 million to Boston’s Hebrew SeniorLife and Brown University to find ways to improve the hodgepodge of care now available for people with Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias. (Weisman, 9/10)

For generations, it was a basic tenet of donating sperm: Clinics could forever protect their clients’ identities. But, increasingly, donor anonymity is dead. The rise of consumer genetic tests — which allow people to connect with relatives they never knew they had, including some who never intended to be found in the first place — is forcing sperm donation clinics to confront the fact that it is now virtually impossible to guarantee anonymity to their clients. Instead, sites like 23andMe and Ancestry.com are giving customers the genetic clues they need to identify biological parents on their own. (Keshavan, 9/11)

Earlier this year, the biotech community mourned the loss of Michael Becker, a former pharmaceutical industry executive who turned his cancer into a teaching moment. In 2018, we watched on his blog as cancer drugs failed him, as he became hale and hearty as he stopped chemo, and then as the cancer returned. The tumors invaded his bones, so he needed a cane. In July, his cancer killed him. (Herper, 9/11)

The Federal Trade Commission is taking aim at certain companies that sell cannabidiol, or CBD, and have claimed their products can treat or cure serious diseases and health conditions. The FTC said on Tuesday that it sent warning letters to three companies that sell CBD oils, tinctures, capsules, gummies and creams. The letters warned that it is illegal to advertise a product that can prevent or cure a disease without reliable scientific evidence to support such claims. (Thomas, 9/10)

The expanding gap between rich and poor is not only widening the gulf in incomes and wealth in America. It is helping the rich lead longer lives, while cutting short the lives of those who are struggling, according to a study released this week by the Government Accountability Office. Almost three-quarters of rich Americans who were in their 50s and 60s in 1992 were still alive in 2014. Just over half of poor Americans in their 50s and 60s in 1992 made it to 2014. (Fadulu, 9/10)

Ask Tom Yendell how he learned to eat, use a computer, place phone calls or do anything else with his feet, and he’ll turn the question around. “How did you figure out how to do things with your hands?” he said recently. “You don’t need to be shown how to do it. You just do it naturally.” Mr. Yendell, 57, is a painter in Hampshire, England. He was born without arms, after his mother was prescribed the drug thalidomide during her pregnancy, which was later found to cause birth defects. (Diep, 9/10)

A single new fossil can change the way we think about human origins, but discovering it — deep in a cave or buried in rock — remains a daunting struggle for hammer-wielding paleoanthropologists. “It can take years and luck to find the right one,” said Aurélien Mounier, a paleoanthropologist at the French National Museum of Natural History. (Zimmer, 9/10)