Funded Projects

Sleep is a critical behavioral state that fulfills essential needs for health, including clearing waste products (e.g., protein aggregates) from the brain. But sleep is not everlasting. As humans age, sleep quality strikingly deteriorates, and this decline is associated with dementias (e.g., Alzheimer’s disease).

With an aging population, neurodegenerative disorders contribute increasingly to our global health burden with no cure or effective treatments. Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) and frontotemporal dementia (FTD) are two neurodegenerative disorders that are distinct in clinical presentation (ALS impairs movement/breathing, whereas FTD impairs behavior/cognition).

There is one characteristic of all neurodegenerative diseases: the accumulation and aggregation of abnormal proteins in the patient’s brain. These aggregations are thought to induce neuronal cell death and brain degeneration.

With an aging population, neurodegenerative disorders contribute increasingly to our global health burden with no cure or effective treatments. Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) and frontotemporal dementia (FTD) are two neurodegenerative disorders that are distinct in clinical presentation (ALS impairs movement/breathing, whereas FTD impairs behavior/cognition).

The causes of neurodegenerative disorders like multiple sclerosis or Alzheimer’s disease are incompletely understood, hindering our ability to gain precise diagnoses and design effective therapeutics. Understanding how the circadian rhythms regulate myelin-forming precursors will impart unique insights into normal and aberrant myelination and will have a positive impact on developing therapeutic strategies to restructure myelin.

This team will use their Neuroscience:Translate award to develop a large-scale bi-directional neural interface that will restore high-fidelity vision to people blinded by retinal degeneration.

This team will use their Neuroscience:Translate award to employ a novel therapeutic technique to correct pathogenic mutations causing Parkinson’s disease.

This team will use their Neuroscience:Translate award to develop an entirely new class of ischemic stroke treatment device that will lead to improved clot extraction to improve the success of endovascular thrombectomy.

This team will use their Neuroscience:Translate award to develop the first wearable ultrasound (US) device for the treatment of inflammatory diseases, such as Rheumatoid Arthritis (RA) and Inflammatory Bowel Disease.

This team is developing a small molecule that targets a voltage-gated ion channel within the inner ear for the symptomatic relief of peripheral vertigo attacks. They will use their Neuroscience:Translate award to further develop this molecule to restore normal function and improve activities of daily living for patients experiencing peripheral vertigo.

Resilience to Alzheimer’s disease (RAD) describes those rare individuals who exhibit normal cognitive function
while harboring a high disease burden. Better understanding of the mechanisms that confer protection against
cognitive decline despite high-level AD pathology offers potential therapeutic insights for preventing dementia in AD. Recent advances in the field provide a unique opportunity to explore the spatial distribution of molecules in the human brain at an unprecedented level of detail.

This team has identified a promising protein-based therapeutic to improve stroke recovery.  The team will use the Neuroscience:Translate award to identify key components of this protein to maximize its therapeutic potential for stroke treatments.

This team recently identified a selective biomarker of inflammation-promoting immune cells in the central nervous system. They will use their Neuroscience:Translate award to develop non-invasive molecular imaging strategies to distinguish between harmful (pro-inflammatory) and helpful (anti-inflammatory) immune cells in patients with Multiple sclerosis (MS).

This team has developed a new therapy for patients with spinal cord injury, involving injection into the spinal cord of patient-derived stem cells within an engineered protective gel. They will use their Neuroscience:Translate award to further test and develop this novel therapy in preparation for first-in-human clinical trials. 

This team recently discovered that a small molecule they had originally developed to treat Parkinson’s disease can also reduce the volume of glioblastoma tumors – the most common form of aggressive brain tumor — by targeting the mitochondrial protein Miro1. They will use their Neuroscience:Translate award to study the mechanisms of the compound’s anti-tumor action and prepare to apply for investigational-new-drug status to move this discovery toward the clinic.

Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is the sixth leading cause of death in the United States and there is a tremendous need for improved therapeutic strategies to treat this prevalent neurodegenerative disease. A devastating symptom of AD is progressive memory loss; this particular disease feature has proven difficult to treat. However, research has begun to unravel novel drivers of AD, including the important role the body’s immune system plays in promoting memory loss. 

Neuroinflammation is common in several neurodegenerative diseases, with brain immune cells, specifically
microglia, being a main driver of the inflammatory process. Understanding what triggers microglial activation and its pathways will lead to a better knowledge of inflammatory mechanisms involved in neurodegenerative disease pathology. Circular RNAs (circRNAs) have been studied extensively in the peripheral immune system due to their ability to induce innate immune responses. 

Maintaining the health and function of the aging brain is crucial to improving the quality of older people’s lives and reducing societal burden. Aging is often accompanied by a decline in memory for life events (episodic memory), especially in those at risk for Alzheimer’s disease (AD). Yet some at-risk individual’s manage to maintain memory function, which raises important questions about the brain mechanisms that underly memory resilience.

Sleep is critical for brain function in many animals, and chronic disruptions in sleep patterns are strongly linked to the emergence of neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s. When animals sleep, neural
activity and brain metabolism change dramatically; however, we do not know what the molecular functions of
sleep are in the brain, nor do we know how these processes are linked to brain health. 

Project's stimulation method may provide a powerful tool to reduce disability after a stroke, and the wearable form factor allows users to receive intensive therapy during their normal daily routine

Developing an automated seizure detection and localization system based on deep neural networks, EEG data, and real-time video with the goal to dramatically increase neurologist diagnostic capabilities while improving quality of care.

Developing a protein-engineered nerve implant that mimics the biochemical and mechanical cues of native tissue in order to enhance the potential for neural regeneration following injury.