Project description
Keeping old brains healthy
The prevalence of cognitive decline increases with age. Nutrition is one aspect that is being investigated in response to population ageing and preventing the onset of cognitive decline. The role of nutrition in maintaining cognition could provide new solutions via medical and nutritional sciences. The EU-funded CAN project will conduct interdisciplinary cross-sectional research based on pioneering methodologies and technologies from the combined fields of nutritional epidemiology and cognitive neuroscience (NCN). It will bring new knowledge on brain structure and functions that can be supported by specific nutrients or dietary patterns with deep impact for healthy brain ageing.
Objective
Since 2014, cross-section and interventional work at the Nutrition Research Centre Ireland, Waterford Institute of Technology has demonstrated the importance of good nutrition, and the benefits of targeted nutritional supplementation, in optimising the neurocognitive environment. Research at the centre has intensified over the last few years to support a biologically plausible rationale whereby nutritional intervention can positively impact on cognitive outcomes in cognitively healthy and mildly impaired individuals. Importantly, what remains to be fully understood is the specific brain regions and neural networks that are potentially mediated by nutrition. Inspiring new programs of medical research can translate findings from nutritional science into innovative clinical assessment tools, technologies, and therapies to advance the practice of modern medicine. At the frontiers of this path-breaking effort is research within the emerging interdisciplinary field of nutritional cognitive neuroscience (NCN), which was established at the Decision Neuroscience Laboratory, University of Illinois. Using state of the art methodologies and technologies from the fields of nutritional epidemiology and cognitive neuroscience, NCN aims to advance our understanding of the beneficial effects of nutrition on the ageing brain. The Cognition And Nutrition (CAN) project will generate new knowledge within the NCN field to better understand the ways in which aspects of brain structure and function can be supported by particular nutrients and dietary patterns. In addition, CAN will stimulate interdisciplinary collaboration and bi-directional transfer of knowledge between both centres. Ultimately, this work will have profound implications for understanding healthy brain aging and for treating age-related neurological disease, as well as improving the precision of nutritional interventions that will inform future research practices and public policy.
Fields of science
Keywords
Programme(s)
Funding Scheme
MSCA-IF - Marie Skłodowska-Curie Individual Fellowships (IF)Coordinator
X91 K0EK Waterford
Ireland