Research Projects

Alzheimers disease (AD) is a neurodegenerative disease affecting the aged population and is projected to increase 3-fold in the next 30 years. Treatment options in AD are limited due to complex pathological processes and the blood-brain barrier (BBB), which restrict entry molecules into the brain. A finding in AD is the loss of cholinergic neurons...

Alzheimer’s disease (AD) has far-reaching societal and economic consequences, emphasizing the urgent need for effective treatment solutions. However, to date, over 99% of AD clinical trials have failed. Inadequate patient stratification is a key contributing factor due to the enormous clinical and pathological heterogeneity in AD. AD is...

The goal of the proposal is to identify the association of different narrative perseverations features in mild cognitive impairment (MCI) subtypes with their neural oscillatory profiles. MCI patients show moderately impaired performance on neuropsychological tests but relatively intact global cognition and daily functioning. Validated as different...

Brain plasticity and neuronal network oscillations are crucial brain processes that depend on the timing precision of neuronal activity. These processes change during healthy brain development and are disrupted early on Alzheimers disease (AD) with controversies on the onset of their impairment. Thus, comprehensive studies of plasticity considering...

Cognitive deficits caused by ageing, neurodegenerative diseases or brain injury represent a major public health issue. They are associated with a disruption of neural oscillations in large-scale brain networks, which cannot be restored using current treatments. Here, I propose a new neuromodulation framework for manipulating neural oscillations...

Depressed mood, agitation, false beliefs, lack of motivation and other alterations in behaviour, usually named with the umbrella term of neuropsychiatric symptoms (NPS), are commonly observed in people with Alzheimers disease (AD). NPS are highly prevalent in people with AD (35-85%) and increase the risk of dementia by up to 10 times. The onset of...

Cerebral autoregulation and neurovascular coupling have a critical role in sustaining brain activity and preventing irreversible damage. Yet, despite revolutionary advances in neuroimaging methods questions remain on the relation and reciprocal interactions between cerebral hemodynamics (blood flow, oxygenation, vascular regulation) and neuronal...

Tauopathies, including Alzheimer’s Disease (AD), characterized by the brain accumulation of abnormal Tau proteins, represent a significant unmet medical need. Neuroinflammation is a hallmark of these diseases. Although several neuroimmune regulations, notably involving microglia, have been largely studied recently, the role of neutrophils and the...

The blood-brain barrier (BBB) is a major obstacle in treating diseases of the central nervous system (CNS) such as Parkinson's, Alzheimer's, Schizophrenia and brain cancer, affecting 180 million Europeans with less than 5% of current candidate drugs effectively reaching the brain. NAP4DIVE strives to revolutionize the traditionally expensive and...

Interictal epileptic discharges (IEDs) are pathological brain activities involving sharp spikes in electrical field potentials that occur preferentially during sleep. In epilepsy, IEDs occur between seizures, and often in deep brain regions such as the medial temporal lobe (MTL).IEDs during sleep disrupt memory and are associated with cognitive...

Alzheimers disease (AD) is the most common cause of dementia and a major global health challenge. AD has a long pre-symptomatic phase spanning several decades. The accuracy of clinical AD diagnostics is mediocre, especially in primary care. This results in suboptimal treatment and care, which is especially problematic in light of emerging anti...

Protein aggregation hallmarks several neurodegenerative diseases, including Alzheimer's and Parkinson's. In Parkinson's, aggregation of the intrinsically disordered protein (IDP) alpha-synuclein (Syn) leads to its intracellular deposition into Lewy bodies, which causes neuronal dysfunction. Recently it was discovered that Syn can undergo liquid...