As we enter the pharmacological era for the treatment of Alzheimer disease (AD), there is a growing urgency to diagnosis AD as early as possible. The ability to visualize the living brain with imaging techniques holds great promise in detecting the first lesions caused by AD and, because mapping the course of the disease over time is important for testing drug efficacy, imaging is potentially useful in drug development. In the last few years, we have been exploring imaging approaches designed to map AD's effect on the living brain. Here, these attempts will be reviewed, highlighting the advantages but also the potential pitfalls of imaging a dysfunctional brain.