Research Projects

As the population is growing older, the risk for dementia increases. The complexity of dementia calls for a multidisciplinary approach; in this project I will combine the research fields of Epidemiology, Genetics, Psychology and Cognitive Neuroscience. It is crucial to identify persons at risk for developing dementia, as possible treatment...

Understanding the genetics of Alzheimer's disease (AD) is one of the best ways of improving our knowledge of the disease's underlying pathophysiological processes. Indeed, genetic factors account for up to 70% of the attributable risk in common forms of AD. The advent of genomic approaches has led to the characterization of 26 genetic determinants...

Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is an ever-increasing public health concern among the aging population and is the most common form of dementia affecting more than 15 million individuals worldwide and around 5 million Europeans. The direct and indirect costs of AD and other dementias amount to more than €440,000 million each year (www.alz.org, 2010).Even...

In the absence of a cure for dementia, most research is aimed at an early diagnosis as it opens the way to timely future care and treatment, and can help people take control of their lives and plan ahead. However, people with moderate to severe dementia and their carers are often not receiving services of the type, quality and timing that they need...

IMI’s Call 8 is geared to develop knowledge frameworks for ‘druggable mechanisms’ for two domains of pathophysiology. In response to this call, we propose (I) the development of a generic AETIONOMY pipeline to capture and infer over mechanistic knowledge of pathophysiology, and  (II) the focused application of this pipeline to derive clinically...

The main objective of this first 2-year period as a post-doctoral research fellow at BWH/MGH Harvard Medical School is to get training in novel Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) and Pittsburgh Compound B–Positron Emission Tomography (PIB-PET) techniques, their analysis methods, and applications to aging and age-related neurodegenerative diseases...

The JA will be contribute to public health programmes in Europe and develop Alzheimers disease (AD) and dementia prevention and care models in different European countries. The aim is to contribute to improvements in health by supporting and facilitating quality and efficiency of public health and healthcare policies and interventions. Synergy and...

Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is the leading cause of dementia in the Western world and to date no cure nor any preventive strategy are available for this neurodegenerative disorder. Bacterial 16S rRNA sequencing from fecal samples revealed a remarkable shift in the gut microbiota of conventionally-raised AD mice compared to healthy, wild-type mice...

Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is the most common cause of dementia in the elderly, and a major reason for disability and death. The time course of AD varies between different people affected, and being able to tell in advance how the disease is likely to progress would have a great value for patient, their caregivers and for all of society. In the...

Everybody grows old. But while some people grow old in good health, others experience severe disease, such as Alzheimer's disease. Recent research demonstrates that Alzheimer's disease shares several features with the ageing process and suggests that the pathology is the consequence of something that goes wrong during physiological ageing...

Beta-amyloid (β-amyloid) deposition is considered to be a necessary - but not sufficient - step on the path towards Alzheimer’s disease (AD). Depiction of brain β-amyloid in vivo can support an early diagnosis, and even provide an opportunity for consider secondary prevention of AD. Currently, however, the value of β-amyloid PET remains elusive...

DEMTEST has established a large European and global collaboration between national surveillance units and dementia research centres, facilitating cooperation between neurologists, neuropathologists and neuroscientists. We work on standardisation of tests that are currently available and harmonise their use between centers worldwide. We define...