Research Projects

A striking challenge in diagnosis and therapy of neurodegenerative diseases is the design of drugs capable of crossing the blood-brain barrier (BBB), a tightly regulated barrier that prevents the passage of drugs from the blood to the brain. In vitro cellular BBB models are available, but they mimic only healthy conditions without taking into...

DECIDE (Diagnostic Enhancement of Confidence by an International Distributed Environment), aims at creating a e-Infrastructure to enhance the diagnostic confidence in chronic brain diseases such as Alzheimer and dementia. Proper management of these neurodegenerative diseases are thought to be very important in terms of health-economical point of...

Recent human epidemiological and animal experimentation studies have revealed that negative conditions occurring prenatally influence the appearance of metabolic and cardiovascular diseases, some of which are in turn risk factors for Alzheimer’s disease (AD). The aim of this proposal is to determine if and how early-life stress may precipitate...

FERROptosis inhibitors for NEUROdegenerative disorders (NeuroFerro) will focus on the development of potent compounds with improved pharmacokinetic properties, including blood-brain barrier (BBB) permeability for future application in the treatment of neurodegenerative disorders. Ferroptosis is non-apoptotic programmed cell death that has been...

The conference objective is to bring stakeholders together to discuss major brain diseases, i.e. stroke and Alzheimer disease in the societal context in order to highlight the imbalance between the societal and individual costs of brain disease, and the resources allocated to dealing with the problem, and to help build a more coordinated European...

Since Alzheimer disease (AD) affects up to 50% of individuals above 85, we will witness the three-fold increase in the number of patients by 2050 if no efficient therapy will be found. The FLORIN offers non-invasive real-time monitoring of key mechanisms involved in the AD pathogenesis by avant-garde bioimaging at temporal resolution less than 1...

The mechanisms of Alzheimer’s disease (AD) have remained poorly understood while com- mon animal models have not helped in finding efficient therapies for the disease. This pro- ject aims to generate new human cellular models allowing for the purification of specific neural cell types involved in AD. We generate patient neural cells through...

Neuronal circuits in mammalian brain act predominantly via excitatory synapses on dendritic spines. Formation of new spines in adult brain constitutes the structural basis of neuronal plasticity. The underlying molecular mechanisms remain largely unknown but depend essentially on kinase-dependent signalling pathways. Final formation of synapses on...

BBMRI-ERIC: the Biobanking and BioMolecular resources Research Infrastructure - European Research Infrastructure Consortium, aims to establish, operate and develop a Pan-European distributed research infrastructure in order to facilitate the access to biological resources as well as facilities and to support high quality biomolecular and biomedical...

New knowledge is not necessarily readily applied in medicine, even when there is evidence of its effectiveness. As a result of the gap between knowing and doing, policy makers, professional care providers, patients and their families have benefited too little from new developments. Implementation research has developed models for stepwise...

Ageing is recognized as one of the greatest social and economical challenges of the 21century for European societies. With, Vascular Cognitive Impairment (VCI) being one of the leading causes of age-related cognitive impairment and one of the major causes of disability in the elderly. Although, the concept of VCI was introduced in 1993, current...

Challenge. Caring for the increasing numbers of people across Europe with advanced dementia and palliative care needs who live in care homes is difficult and demanding. People with advanced dementia can be immobile, non-verbal and unable to take part in day-to-day activities. They can be unsettled or agitated, with low quality-of-life and elevated...