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MEET THE EXPERTS · No. 9 of 10
The neuroscientist who showed that estrogen helps run the brain’s power supply.
Who is Roberta Diaz Brinton?
Roberta Diaz Brinton, PhD, is a neuroscientist and the director of the Center for Innovation in Brain Science at the University of Arizona. She is a laboratory scientist who studies how brain cells make and use energy, and what happens to that system as women age.
What she saw first
Estrogen was long thought of as a reproductive hormone. Brinton’s research helped show it is also part of the brain’s energy system, helping brain cells and their tiny power plants, the mitochondria, use fuel.
In 2015, she and her colleagues described perimenopause as a “neurological transition state,” meaning the years leading up to menopause are a real transition for the brain, not only for the ovaries.
What the science shows now
Her ideas are now shaping the field. In 2024, Brinton worked with Dr. Lisa Mosconi’s team on the first images of estrogen receptors in the living human brain, which showed those receptors changing across the menopause transition. Scientists are now studying timing: when in midlife the brain may be most open to support.
WHY IT MATTERS TO YOU
The brain runs on energy every second of your life, and hormones help manage that supply. Brinton’s work is one reason scientists now see midlife as a key window for brain health, and a reason for women to take brain-fog symptoms seriously rather than shrug them off.
Follow her work
Website: healthsciences.arizona.edu/about/executive-leadership/roberta-brinton-phd
Learn more: her research papers and the Center for Innovation in Brain Science
Sources
Brinton RD, Yao J, Yin F, Mack WJ, Cadenas E. Perimenopause as a neurological transition state. Nature Reviews Endocrinology (2015). pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/?term=Brinton+perimenopause+neurological+transition+state
Mosconi L, …, Brinton RD. In vivo brain estrogen receptor density by neuroendocrine aging. Scientific Reports (2024). www.nature.com/articles/s41598-024-62820-7
Dr. Roberta Diaz Brinton is not affiliated with The Broadside. We feature her work because it helps bring new science to everyday people.
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