On 13 September, partners working on the H2020-funded RECOGNISED project met during an General Assembly meeting, held online and in-person in Barcelona, co-Chaired by Profs. Rafa Simo (Vall d’Hebron University Hospital) and Noemi Lois (Queen's University, Belfast), the co-Leads of the project. Attended by representatives of the 21 Institutions participating in RECOGNISED, including academic institutions, SMEs and patient organisations, the General Assembly (GA) meeting summarised recent project developments and provided a forum for discussing upcoming plans. Alzheimer Europe was represented by Angela Bradshaw. The four-year long RECOGNISED project is studying the biological mechanisms that cause structural and functional alterations in the retina in people with type 2 diabetes, to determine whether these same pathways play a role in the events observed in the brain during the development of cognitive impairment and dementia. Importantly, RECOGNISED is assessing whether evaluating the retina, easily accessible with non-invasive tests, could help in identifying earlier cognitive impairment in people with T2D, so that appropriate support can be given.
During the General Assembly meeting, RECOGNISED workpackage leaders provided brief summaries of ongoing activities, updating project partners on recent advances and discoveries. Despite interruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, preclinical research on animal models of diabetes and Alzheimer's disease are progressing well, with efficient collaborations between laboratories based in different countries, generating extensive genetic, behavioural, cognitive and imaging datasets for analysis. Of note, RECOGNISED partners highlighted the successful recruitment of participants to the RECOGNISED clinical studies, which are recruiting from 11 centres based in 8 different countries. Over 250 participants have been recruited to the RECOGNISED longitudinal study, which is assessing retinal biomarkers (measured using eye tests) in older people with diabetes, with or without cognitive impairment. RECOGNISED partners then discussed additional analyses that could be performed on the collected cross-sectional data, which might provide extra disease insights. The afternoon sessions of the GA were focused on exploitation, dissemination and communications, highlighting some of the considerations for business development and underlining the importance of disseminating RECOGNISED outputs to relevant stakeholders. RECOGNISED partners provided their views on the key stakeholders and audiences to reach with RECOGNISED communications, and also worked together on messaging to capture advances in RECOGNISED research. Prof. Lois and Pascal Kahlem, project manager of RECOGNISED, closed the General Assembly meeting by thanking all attendees for their valuable input, and continued efforts on behalf of the project.
