Research Projects

The objective of Mylife is to support independence for older people with reduced cognitive function by giving them access to simple and intuitive services that are adapted to their individual needs and wishes. The ambition of the Mylife project is to provide network-based access to, and management of, commercially and/or freely available software...

Many older adults living in residential care homes suffer from dementia and depression. MIDDEL aims to determine if music interventions can help. Specifically, this trial will provide robust and generalisable results concerning the comparative effects of group music therapy (GMT), recreational choir singing (RCS), their combination, or standard...

Nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide (NAD+) is a central redox cofactor and the limiting substrate of key metabolic enzymes. The constellation of cellular functions in which NAD+ is involved makes its availability critical for cell survival, and its depletion is a leading factor in a number of diseases in humans, ranging from rare inherited defects to...

Microfluidics have become a powerful tool in biotechnology and life sciences, whereas the nanofluidic regime remains widely unused in industry and the clinical environment. Especially protein misfolding diseases such as Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s and Huntington’s disease, recently experience a growing demand for single-molecule detection capabilities...

Alzheimer’s disease, Lewy-body dementias (including Parkinson’s disease) and other neurodegenerative dementias are major causes of disease, reduced patient- and caregiver quality of life, and increasing societal health costs. All have lengthy (decades) pre-dementia- and pre-clinical stages, but patients will have suffered irreversible brain damage...

Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is characterized by brain nerve cell death and dementia, but before dementia, leading up to these final and irreversible end-points we first see loss of synapses, which are the contacts between nerve cells allowing us to think, learn and function as independent beings. Coincident with early synaptic loss we also see...

Alzheimer’s disease (AD) and related disorders leading to dementia are associated with staggering costs and suffering. Recently, there has been some progress in the search for effective therapeutic interventions and it is clear that any treatment is likely to be most effective if administered at the earliest stage of disease, but the health care...

COMFORTAGE is a joint effort of medical experts (i.e., neurologists, psychiatrists, neuropsychologists, nurses, memory clinics), social scientists and humanists, technical experts (i.e., data scientists, AI experts, robotic experts) and Digital Innovation Hubs to establish a pan European framework for Community-based, Integrated and People-Centric...

PRIME introduces the novel concept of insulin signalling as a key mechanism underlying the multimorbidity of major mental and somatic illnesses. It is well known that aberrant insulin signalling causes high health and socioeconomic burden through its role in diabetes, metabolic syndrome, and obesity. We posit that the impact of ‘insulinopathies’ is...

Major depressive disorder, dementia, anxiety disorders, and substance abuse affect a substantial part of the European older population. Over 70% of Europeans reside in cities, and this percentage will increase in the next decades. Urbanization and ageing have enormous implications for public mental health. Cities pose major challenges for older...

Alzheimer's disease is a disease in which specific peptides, so-called beta-amyloids, accumulate in the brain, leading to the destruction of neurons and the resulting clinical functional effects, e.g. memory and orientation problems. Discussions are ongoing as to whether or not Alzheimer's disease may be transmissible between individuals and could...

We will develop and validate an intervention (SHAPE) in 330 people with mild dementia; combining self-management, health promotion, and e-learning. The study is a multi-site, randomised, controlled, single-blinded trial with parallel groups. The intervention group is compared with treatment as usual (TAU). The primary outcome is to evaluate the...