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[Image: see text] COVER ILLUSTRATION Individuals with metabolic syndrome, a syndrome characterized by increased waist circumference (illustrated as the cartoon man and woman in the picture), fasting plasma glucose, triglycerides, blood pressure, and decreased HDL cholesterol (illustrated as involved tissues: adipose, vascular, pancreatic, and muscular) have been shown exhibit an increased risk of dementia and other forms of neurocognitive and neurodegenerative impairments. Comparing the structural T1‐weighted magnetic resonance images of individuals with and without metabolic syndrome from an extended pedigree of Mexican‐Americans revealed distinct gray matter density differences in specific brain regions. Individuals with metabolic syndrome were found to have lower gray matter density values in the posterior cerebellum, brainstem, orbitofrontal cortex, caudate nuclei, right insula, right amygdala, and right superior temporal gyrus (illustrated as cartoon brain with involved regions in yellow, FWE p < 0.05 and red FWE p < 0.01). These regions are collectively involved in cognition (reasoning), emotion (valence), and reward perception. For details see Kotkowski et al.