FNR PEARL Chair on Alzheimer’s disease for Pr

Dementia has been recognized by the World Health Organisation as a significant well being problem. With an anticipated improve from at the moment 55 million circumstances to about 150 million in 2050, dementia will considerably have an effect on healthcare techniques worldwide. Approximately two-thirds of all dementia sufferers are affected by Alzheimer’s illness, a neurodegenerative dysfunction that results in reminiscence dysfunction, behavioural disturbances, and lack of all larger cognitive features. To date, the organic mechanisms liable for this illness stay unclear and neither preventive nor disease-modifying therapies exist. “It has increasingly become clear that Alzheimer’s is, in fact, not a disease of the elderly but starts much earlier in life,” explains Prof. Michael Heneka, director of the LCSB and head of the Neuroinflammation group. “Understanding its origins is therefore key to be able to detect and treat it before the devastating effects on the brain fully appear.”

As a board-certified neurologist and clinician-scientist, Prof. Heneka has in depth expertise in learning neurodegenerative illnesses at experimental, preclinical and scientific ranges. Before becoming a member of the LCSB in January 2022, he was a professor for Clinical Neurosciences on the University of Bonn, the place he established a neurodegenerative outpatient unit and headed the Department of Neurodegenerative Disease and Geriatric Psychiatry. He has lengthy been learning the underlying molecular mechanisms of Alzheimer’s illness and, particularly, the position of the immune system and its dysregulation.

With this new challenge, known as MINIALZ, Prof. Heneka and his workforce will additional disentangle the position of genetic and environmental influences, corresponding to food plan and way of life, on the onset and development of Alzheimer’s illness. “We will study the interaction of immune cells and neurons in the brain, both in animal models and in cell cultures directly derived from blood samples given by patients,” particulars Michael Heneka. “Our aim is to better understand what role the brain immune cells play in keeping neurons healthy and what happens if their interactions are altered.”

The challenge will capitalise on the latest identification, by Prof. Heneka’s workforce, of a brand new mechanism: microglia, the immune cells of the mind, type tunnelling nanotubes with neighbouring neurons to free them from pathological proteins, making certain their perform and survival. Preliminary outcomes counsel that the concerned mechanisms are faulty in microglia carrying mutations related to Alzheimer’s illness, putting this community of nanotubes on the core of neurodegeneration. This brand-new discipline of research is promising, opening new avenues for a number of mind illnesses and eliciting a number of curiosity within the worldwide scientific group.

By learning the underlying mechanisms of Alzheimer’s illness on the molecular stage, MINIALZ will give necessary indications for earlier prognosis and potential remedy choices. “We want to coordinate fundamental research on dementia in Luxembourg with translational and clinical research efforts,” says Prof Heneka. “Our results should help to develop new biomarkers or therapeutic measures and support Luxembourg’s ambition to provide excellent healthcare to dementia patients.”

“Over the past decade, the LCSB has become a stronghold of neuroscience research, focusing in particular on Parkinson’s disease. With this new FNR PEARL Chair, the centre is expanding its expertise and tackling neurodegeneration on a broader level,” emphasises Prof. Jens Kreisel, Vice-Rector for Research of the University of Luxembourg. “We are very pleased that Prof. Michael Heneka, one of the most internationally renowned scientists in Alzheimer’s research, has joined the university and will now lead this new initiative.”

“The challenge as an entire has the potential to disrupt the sphere. We see it as a necessary probability for Luxembourg to stay on the forefront of Alzheimer’s illness analysis, with a complete plan for primary analysis that may result in scientific outcomes”, concludes Dr Marc Schiltz, CEO of the Luxembourg National Research Fund (FNR). “The FNR is dedicated to supporting the sort of endeavour, which can be important not just for biomedical analysis but in addition for the good thing about public well being in Luxembourg.”