Research Projects

Median survival for people that are diagnosed with glioblastoma (GBM) is only 15 months. Chemoradiotherapy and targeted therapies still fail to combat peritumoral relapse after tumour removal. Preventing peritumoral brain invasion is the main target to cure GBM. Our project aims to validate a proof-of concept for a new medical device (MD) GBM Neuro...

The rules linking odor perception to odorant structure are unknown. No scientist nor perfumer can predict an odor based on its molecular structure, or decipher a molecular structure based on its smell. It is this puzzle we aim to solve. In vision and audition coding was probed by linking critical physical stimulus dimensions (wavelength/frequency)...

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...

PHARMA-COG aims to develop a new integrated model to accelerate the development of drug candidates for MS, PKD and AD. The innovation relies on a 'multidimensional matrix' approach, integrating all available and renewed inputs (biomarkers/animal, human models/physiological and pharmacological challenges, Phase 0/1/1b to reduce the attrition rate...

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...

As global life-expectancy increases so do pathological age-related conditions impacting cognition. The worldwide prevalence of Alzheimer’s Disease is expected to rise from 46 to 131.5 million affected people in the next 30 years, which will drastically compromise quality of life for many individuals and place a considerable economic burden on...

Accumulation of neurotoxic amyloid beta peptides (Ab) in the brain is considered to be the central event in the pathogenesis of Alzheimer’s disease (AD). Ab is released from the beta-amyloid precursor protein (APP) during specialised processing events. This proposal aims to examine presenilin 2 (PS2) protein-mediated molecular and cellular events...

For the human brain, music is a highly complex and versatile stimulus that is closely linked to speech, executive-motor, emotion, and memory networks. In severe ageing-related neurological disorders, such as post-stroke aphasia and Alzheimer’s disease (AD) dementia, music and singing may provide a valuable alternative route to verbal and emotional...

Amyloid beta peptide (Abeta) is a normal product of the amyloid precursor protein (APP) proteolysis in the brain. While Abeta synaptotoxicity has been extensively studied as central to Alzheimer's disease (AD) pathogenesis, the mechanisms by which physiological Abeta regulates synapse function remain unknown. Utilizing two-photon excitation laser...

Elderly people are frequently affected by a decline of mental and physical abilities, which results in anxiety, frailty, loneliness and reclusiveness. Often these persons live alone, spatially separated from their families and friends, not able to meet or visit them on a regular basis. The risk of developing dementia can be reduced by playing...

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...

Background: The projected steep rise in global dementia prevalence will largely occur in low and middle-income countries (LMIC) and vulnerable populations in high-income countries (HIC). Up to 30% of all dementia is attributable to potentially modifiable risk factors. Mobile Health (mHealth) technology allows for scalable and widely implementable...