The speed at which the human brain processes information is higher than in other animal species. Neuroscientist René Wilbers discovered that by examining millions of brain cells collected from a live sample of brain tissue.

Huib Mansvelder, professor and head of the department of Integrative Neurophysiology at VU Amsterdam, received the prestigious European Research Council Advanced Grant this week. This is the largest personal research grant in Europe.

“We all believe in the importance of a different piece of the puzzle.” prof. dr. Guus Smit says when he explains why this consortium was formed together with 20 other researchers. “It’s about connecting the dots, the cohesion between seemingly different processes underlying the development of dementia from different perspectives. That is what we are looking for in Mechanisms Of DEMentia (MODEM). Because that coherence has to be there. There is no other way.”

The Dutch Research Council (NWO) has awarded an ENW-M2 open competition grant of 730 k€ to CNCR researcher Wiep Scheper (PI team) to study the role of de-ubiquitinating enzymes in tau-induced dysfunction of the neuronal auto- and endo-lysosomal system. In this multidisciplinary project Scheper PI of the Molecular Neurodegeneration group teams up with ubiquitin signalling expert Aysegul Sapmaz (LUMC, Leiden).

Max will start at FGA on March 1st, building a team aimed at understanding the molecular mechanisms and functional relevance of mRNA trafficking and local translation in neuronal subcellular compartments in health and disease.

Irune Guerra San Juan and Matthijs Verhage (FGA) became partners in an international consortium that designs and tests oligonucleotides to suppress poison exon insertion and restore full length Stathmin 2 expression in sporadic ALS

A core problem in several dementias is the inability to form new memories and gradual loss of old memories. Funded by a ZonMW open competition grant, the teams of Wiep Scheper (Amsterdam UMC Human Genetics/FGA), Priyanka Rao-Ruiz (VU MCN) and Michel van den Oever (VU MCN) will collaborate to obtain mechanistic insight into memory formation and persistence and how this is disturbed in dementia.

In a study published in Nature Genetics, Cato Romero, Mats Nagel, and Sophie van der Sluis teamed up with colleagues from the Complex Trait Genetics department and the Million Veteran Program to scrutinize the genetic similarity of twelve psychiatric disorders. Besides identifying shared genes and biological substrates between pairs of disorders, they also elucidated the challenges jeopardizing the future success of cross-trait genetic research.

Van der Kant and the VU Medical Center receive funding for unravelling the associative link between exercise and lipid metabolism in prevention against Alzheimer.

In a study published in Molecular Psychiatry, Jessie Brunner, Hanna Lammertse and Annemiek van Berkel (FGA) teamed up with Sophie van der Sluis (CTG) and the proteomics facility (MCN) to optimize statistical power for iPSC-based study designs.