Dr. Miranda Orr is an Assistant Professor of Internal Medicine in the Section on Geriatrics and Gerontology Division at Wake Forest School of Medicine, Winston-Salem, NC and Research Health Scientist at the W.G. (Bill) Hefner VA Medical Center, Salisbury, NC. She is a translational neuroscientist with expertise that spans the biology of aging and tau-associated neurodegeneration. A primary goal of her research is to understand cellular and molecular processes driving neurodegeneration and cognitive impairment during the prodromal period associated with Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias. Her career has focused on tau neurobiology and its role as a cellular stress response at the intersection between healthy brain aging and neurodegeneration. Using this strategy, her laboratory has identified a link between tau pathology and cellular senescence, the quintessence of latent tissue degeneration. This seminal finding has laid the groundwork for further investigation into post-mitotic cellular senescence, a newly recognized neuronal cell fate; the interaction between fundamental cellular aging processes and neuronal pathology; and clinical trials using therapeutics to clear senescent cells.