Our Research - Dementias
Dementias, such as Alzheimer’s disease and fronto-temporal dementia are a range of diseases that affect our brain leading to a steady worsening of our ability to think, remember and carry out everyday tasks, and can also alter our personality. They affect around 50 million people worldwide and incidence is increasing primarily due to an ageing population. There are currently no licensed treatments in the UK that influence the rate of progression of any dementias.
There is a need for dementia research at multiple levels, to help the suffers of today and tomorrow, as well as to prevent it from occurring. Research at the University of Edinburgh spans all these areas.
With regard to disease mechanisms, we focus on understanding why and how a healthy brain transitions into one afflicted by dementia and how this progresses over time, in order to find new therapeutic targets to slow dementia. A brain’s health is dependent on interactions between many different cell types in the brain-vascular cells, glial cells and immune cells, all working to keep neurons in a healthy state, so research must address dementia as a disease of the brain, not merely of neurons (for an example see our Small Vessel Disease webpage). Additionally we must diagnose dementias earlier, before irreversible damage has already happened.
In parallel we must understand how to prevent dementia from happening in the first place. While our genetics is partly responsible for our risk of getting dementia in later life, other lifestyle factors, such as smoking, obesity, and hypertension, particularly in midlife can influence risk as well. Our work in identifying high-risk groups based on health data science and biomarker discovery can both inform on the types of lifestyle changes to advise on, as well as generating cohorts for prevention clinical trials.
Finally, we must help the dementia sufferers of today by improving their quality of life, though care research and technology, ranging from enabling technology in the home, monitoring devices to prolong independence, to research into dementia-friendly open spaces, improving support networks and working with sufferers to better understand their needs.
UoE researchers who work in this area include:
- Prof Giles Hardingham, Director, UK Dementia Research Institute at Edinburgh
- Dr Blanca Diaz-Castro, UK Dementia Research Institute at Edinburgh
- Prof Siddharthan Chandran, UK Dementia Research Institute at Edinrbugh
- Dr Jian Gan, UK Dementia Research Institute at Edinburgh
- Prof David Hunt, UK Dementia Research Institute at Edinburgh
- Dr Barry McColl, UK Dementia Research Institute at Edinburgh
- Dr Veronique Miron, UK Dementia Research Institute at Edinburgh
- Dr Axel Montagne, UK Dementia Research Institute at Edinburgh
- Dr Patricio Opazo, UK Dementia Research Institute at Edinburgh
- Prof Josef Priller, UK Dementia Research Institute at Edinburgh
- Prof Tara Spires-Jones, UK Dementia Research Institute at Edinburgh
- Prof Joanna Wardlaw, UK Dementia Research Institute at Edinburgh
- Dr Tom Russ, Director, Alzheimer Scotland Dementia Research Centre
- Dr Ruth Sibbett, Alzheimer Scotland Dementia Research Centre
- Dr Lucy Stirland, Alzheimer Scotland Dementia Research Centre
- Dr Katherine Walesby, Alzheimer Scotland Dementia Research Centre
- Prof Craig Ritchie, Director, Edinburgh Dementia Prevention
- Dr Graciela Muniz Terrera, Edinburgh Dementia Prevention
- Dr Catherine Pennington, Edinburgh Dementia Prevention
- Prof Heather Wilkinson, Edinburgh Centre for Research on the Experience of Dementia
- Dr Jo Alexjuk, Edinburgh Centre for Research on the Experience of Dementia
- Dr Azucena Guzman, Edinburgh Centre for Research on the Experience of Dementia
- Dr Julie Watson, Edinburgh Centre for Research on the Experienceof Dementia
- Dr Baljean Dhillon, Centre for Clinical Brain Sciences
- Prof Seth Grant, Centre for Clinical Brain Sciences
- Dr Tom MacGillivray, Centre for Clinical Brain Sciences
- Dr Suvankar Pal, Centre for Clinical Brain Sciences
- Dr Bhuvaneish Selvaraj, Centre for Clinical Brain Sciences
- Dr Szu-Han Wang, Centre for Clinical Brain Sciences
- Dr William Whiteley, Centre for Clinical Brain Sciences
- Dr Emanuel Busch, Centre for Discovery Brain Sciences
- Prof Mike Cousin, Centre for Discovery Brain Sciences
- Dr Marria Doitsidiou, Centre for Discovery BrainS ciences
- Dr Jill Fowler, Centre for Discovery Brain Sciences
- Prof Tom Gillingwater, Centre for Discovery Brain Sciences
- Prof Mandy Jackson, Centre for Discovery Brain Sciences
- Dr Lyndsay Murray, Centre for Discovery Brain Sciences
- Dr Guisy Pennetta, Centre for Discovery Brain Sciences
- Dr Jing Qiu, Centre for Discovery Brain Sciences
- Dr Paul Skehel, Centre for Discovery Brain Sciences
- Dr Karen Smillie, Centre for Discovery Brain Sciences
- Dr Javier Escudero Rodriguez, Engineering
- Prof Cathie Sudlow, Centre for Medical Informatics
- Dr Saturnino Luz, Centre for Medical Informatics
- Dr Thanasis Tsanas, Centre for Medical Informatics
Useful weblinks:
- UK Dementia Research Institute at the University of Edinburgh
- Edinburgh Dementia Prevention
- Edinburgh Centre for Research on the Experience of Dementia
- The Advanced Care Research Centre
- Alzheimer Scotland Dementia Research Centre at the University of Edinburgh
- Row Fogo Centre for Research into Ageing and the Brain
- Centre for Discovery Brain Sciences: Ageing and Degeneration
- Centre for Clinical Brain Sciences: Neurodegenerative conditions
- Small Vessel Disease research at University of Edinburgh