Acute brain injuries due to ischemic stroke and traumatic brain injuries (TBI) impose a leading medical and socioeconomic burden. Aside from the acute mortality and morbidity from these diseases, brain injuries are associated with a substantial long-term disability. Therapies for patients with acute brain injuries are limited, the only approved specific therapies for ischemic stroke patients are pharmacological or mechanical recanalization approaches while no specific therapy is available for TBI patients. Moreover, even these limited therapies for recanalization in ischemic stroke patients are available only in the hyperacute phase of vascular occlusion due to contraindications and inefficiency at delayed time points. Thereby, we currently face the situation that less than 20% of all stroke patients and none of the TBI patients receive a specific therapy. On the other side, strategies to improve neurological recovery after acute brain injury are restricted to rehabilitative training. Hence, novel and innovative therapies to support regenerative capacities after brain injury are desperately needed.
Over the past decade, inflammation of the injured brain has come into the focus of preclinical stroke research. Invasion of immune cells from the blood to the brain has been described as a key mechanism, which aggravates the initial infarct volume and exacerbates stroke outcome. On the other side we have observed that some immune cell subpopulations can also have a protective function and promote the recovery during the chronic phase after a stroke.
Therefore, the overall goal of this project is to harness the beneficial functions of the immune response to stroke and modify this immune response so that it supports recovery of stroke patients. We want to specifically utilize in this project the immune cell population of T cells, and exploit the therapeutic potential of these T cells as “Trojan horses” secreting immunoactive and pro-regenerative factors to promote recovery after brain injury (Figure 1).
