Project description
Early Alzheimer’s brain waves as predictive tools
Alzheimer’s disease (AD) begins long before symptoms appear. This makes early detection crucial. Funded by the ERC, the WAVEAD project leverages a unique opportunity: living brain biopsies from patients with idiopathic normal pressure hydrocephalus, some of whom show early AD-related pathology. By studying how AD affects neuronal circuits, WAVEAD examines changes in synaptic strengthening and network function using multielectrode arrays. Machine-learning classifiers can already predict patient pathology from these waveforms. The project now investigates whether glutamatergic and cholinergic signalling patterns, combined with non-invasive transcranial magnetic stimulation and electroencephalogram recordings, can similarly indicate disease status in clinical settings. Success could lead to personalised therapies and early diagnostic tools.
Objective
Due to the early AD-related pathology present in a subpopulation of idiopathic normal pressure hydrocephalus (iNPH) patients, the brains of the iNPH patients offer a unique window to evaluate events taking place during the course of AD pathology progression. Here we take advantage of our continuous access to living brain biopsies from iNPH patients and related clinical data to assess, how AD pathology affects the neuronal circuit operational properties in human brain. During the ERC consolidator project, we have discovered that pre-existing AD-related pathology alters neuronal circuit operational properties, and importantly, impairs the ablity of the network to elicit synaptic strenthening, as evaluated using stimulation protocols on multielectrode arrays (MEA). Interestingly, a supervised machine-learning -based classifier was able to classify and predict the patient pathological status using the synaptic plasticity -induced waveforms. Here we now investigate the whether the waveforms related to glutamatergic signaling and cholinergic signaling have similar predictive value of the patient pathological status and possible clinical diagnosis and whether these readouts obtained from the ex vivo biopsies are correlated in the clinical settings using transcranial magnetic stimulations (TMS) and EEG recordings. Moreover, we probe whether the recorded TMS and EEG waveforms have the same predictive capacity in clinical settings. If succesful, these waveforms could facilitate personalized therapy or serve as a diagnostic tool for detection of early AD and thus have a significant commercialization potential.
Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
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Programme(s)
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
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HORIZON.1.1 - European Research Council (ERC)
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Topic(s)
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Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Funding Scheme
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
HORIZON-ERC-POC - HORIZON ERC Proof of Concept Grants
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Call for proposal
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
(opens in new window) ERC-2025-POC
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70211 KUOPIO
Finland
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