PhD student Imogen Swift (UK DRI at UCL) recently won the Three Minute Thesis competition at University College London, where researchers must present their work to a non-specialist audience in three minutes or less. We spoke to Imogen about her winning presentation, and she shared her top tips for communicating scientific research.
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We are pleased to announce that three new Trustees will join our Board this year. Joining the nine existing Trustees, the new Board members bring a wealth of expertise that will prove invaluable to the Institute as it enters its next phase under new Director Prof Siddharthan Chandran. The three new Trustees are Emma Whitcombe (Charity Consultant), Rabia Khan (Serna Bio) and Roudie Shafie (OVID Health).
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Epigenetics is the study of how biological mechanisms regulate gene expression within cells. This regulatory process can become maladaptive, making cells more vulnerable to protein aggregates that accumulate in neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s.
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RNAs (ribonucleic acid) are fundamental macromolecules for our cells, with crucial roles in the translation of genetic information into complex proteins and in gene expression regulation. Prof Jernej Ule is a leading expert on RNA biology, and having joined the UK DRI at King’s as Centre Director last year, he aims to better understand the roles of RNA regulation in neurodegeneration. We caught up with Prof Ule to hear more about his new lab at King’s, a major project harnessing RNA for targeted therapeutic delivery and his experience of Centre leadership so far.
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To fully understand the complex processes and components that make up our nervous system and how they go wrong in conditions like motor neuron disease (MND), we need to be able to build model systems that closely reflect the processes that occur within the human body.
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Results from Eli Lilly’s phase 3 trial of new Alzheimer’s drug donanemab were presented at the Alzheimer's Association International Conference (AAIC) in Amsterdam today, and published simultaneously in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA).
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UK DRI Founding Funder, Alzheimer's Research UK (ARUK), have today (11 July 2023) published a report showing how investment in dementia research can directly boost the country’s economy. For every £1 invested in dementia research, £2.59 is generated in economic benefits.
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A major new public-private partnership, NEURii, was announced last month aiming to use high-quality individual data, Artificial Intelligence (AI), and Machine Learning (ML) to deliver patient-focused digital health solutions for dementia.
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In the spring of this year, we were pleased to announce the eight awardees in the fifth round of the UK DRI Pilot Studies programme - an initiative designed to encourage UK DRI early career researchers to consider new and innovative avenues of dementia research and take their next step towards independence.
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Co-Chairs of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Dementia, Debbie Abrahams MP and Baroness Browning, visited the UK DRI’s Centre for Care Research and Technology at Imperial College London yesterday, along with Vice-Chair Lord Weir of Ballyholme.
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Smart watches could identify Parkinson’s disease up to seven years before hallmark symptoms appear and a clinical diagnosis can be made, new UK DRI research reveals. The study is published in the journal Nature Medicine.
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A new project by UK DRI researchers aims to identify combinations of existing drugs that could be used together to treat motor neuron disease (MND).
At the UK DRI, we’re working to decipher the biological causes underlying neurodegenerative disease. This is the first step in the development of new treatments, but there are still many hurdles to overcome in identifying promising targets for therapeutic intervention. In the UK, we are fortunate to have the expertise of the Drug Discovery Alliance (DDA), playing a vital role in bridging the gap between discovery research and the pharmaceutical industry.
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We are pleased to announce the four awardees in the third round of the UK DRI Translation Award programme – designed to unlock impact and drive translation within the Institute, kick starting the early development of projects to bring us closer to new treatments and technologies for dementia.
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A new study led by Prof Veronique Miron (UK DRI at Edinburgh) has found that astrocytes, a key support cell in the brain, may play a beneficial role in repairing the myelin that surrounds neurons, which is damaged in multiple sclerosis (MS). Researchers say the findings also have important consequences in ageing and for the treatment of Alzheimer’s disease, where myelin is also damaged.
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We are delighted to announce that Prof Siddharthan Chandran, a world-leading expert in neurodegenerative diseases, will become the new Director of the UK DRI from 1 October 2023.
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It was a busy start to 2023 for the European alliance for neurodegenerative research, CURE-ND, coming together and strengthening ties for a clinical workshop, an ECR meeting and a symposium at the British Neuroscience Association’s Festival of Neuroscience.
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A major new UK DRI project to develop an ‘atlas’ of the gene activity in the blood vessels of the brain is set to transform understanding of vascular dementia. Combining this map with genetic studies, the project will address a critical knowledge gap by identifying which genes influence our risk of vascular dementia, and how their effects manifest.
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Researchers from the UK DRI, Imperial College London, UCL and Newcastle University are collaborating in a major new project to develop a technology that could help identify people at risk of developing dementia by analysing their sleep patterns.
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UK DRI are pleased to announce that Prof Giles Hardingham has been named Interim Director of the Institute while the process to find a new permanent Director continues. He will take up the post on 1 June 2023.
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