Our Research - Small Vessel Disease (SVD)
Small Vessel Diseases (SVDs) are the commonest cause of vascular dementia which itself is the second commonest type of dementia; SVD also worsens cognitive function in Alzheimer’s disease, causes cognitive decline that falls short of dementia, causes a quarter of strokes, and mobility problems.
SVD is a disorder of the small blood vessels (arterioles, capillaries and venules) that run into the brain to supply nutrients like oxygen and glucose, and remove the waste products of metabolism. The blood vessel walls can become thickened, fragmented, and the vessels become narrowed, dilated, stiff, leaky, or inflamed, and lose the ability to supply blood to the brain, for reasons that are poorly understood. This results in damage seen as abnormalities mainly in the brain’s white matter (the ‘wiring’ of the brain) that show up on brain scans.
These abnormalities can increase with age, but also occur with high blood pressure, lifestyle factors and can occasionally be familial. However, what actually causes SVD, and why some people are more affected than others, is poorly understood and so there is no specific treatment.
In our research, we use techniques like magnetic resonance brain imaging to measure and track the SVD abnormalities, find out about the underlying blood vessel function and effects on the wiring of the brain. We also use genetics, blood samples and tests of brain function to build up pictures of what is going wrong.
We study people locally but also collaborate and study people in North America, Europe, and Asia Pacific countries. We are running trials to test drugs that might help stop SVD getting worse. We also study brain samples that people have agreed to donate after they die, and perform careful laboratory experiments to work out what is going on in SVD in ways that it is not possible to do in humans. Recently we wrote a guideline on how to manage SVD for the European Stroke Organisation and are starting a dedicated clinical service to apply what we know to try to stop SVD getting worse.
UoE researchers who work in this area include:
- Prof Rustam Al Shahi Salman, Centre for Clinical Brain Sciences
- Dr Miguel Bernabeu, Centre for Medical Informatics
- Dr Fergus Doubal, Centre for Clinical Brain Sciences
- Prof Karen Horsburgh, Centre for Discovery Brain Sciences
- Dr Barry McColl, Centre for Discovery Brain Sciences and UK Dementia Research Institute
- Dr Axel Montagne, Centre for Clinical Brain Sciences and UK Dementia Research Institute
- Prof Colin Smith, Centre for Clinical Brain Sciences and Edinburgh Brain and Tissue Bank (Director)
- Prof Joanna M Wardlaw, Centre for Clinical Brain Sciences and Row Fogo Centre (Director)
- Dr William Whiteley, Centre for Clinical Brain Sciences
- Prof Anna Williams, Centre for Regenerative Medicine
Useful weblinks
- Row Fogo Centre for Research into Ageing and the Brain | The University of Edinburgh
- Perivascular Space in Small Vessel Disease | Transatlantic network of excellence (small-vessel-disease.org)
- Analysis & processing | The University of Edinburgh
- UK Dementia Research Institute | The University of Edinburgh
- Providing a high quality environment for dementia research | Alzheimer Scotland Dementia Research Centre (ed.ac.uk)
- Edinburgh Dementia Prevention
- CHARGE Consortium
- Lothian Birth Cohorts | The University of Edinburgh