The neural reaction to injury: Clues to the cause and prevention of acquired brain damage and Alzheimer's disease.

Funded Activity Summary

The cellular mechanism underlying neuronal degeneration following head trauma and Alzheimer?s disease is not known and represents the major impediment to developing therapeutic strategies to protect nerve cells. This grant application will utilise a variety of modern research methods to determine the key changes in the brain that are associated with the response of nerve cells to physical trauma. These include not only the structural alterations that immediately follow such injury, but the complex cellular and gene expression changes that determine the ultimate fate of the cell. Both acquired brain injury and degenerative conditions such as Alzheimer?s disease represent an enormous health, social and economic burden. Furthermore, with predictions that Alzheimer?s disease will increase by 3-4 times by the middle of the next century due to the Oaging? of the population, it is becoming even more crucial to establish effective therapeutic interventions. The animal models investigated in this project can be used to unravel the crucial neuronal alterations associated with head trauma and the early stages of Alzheimer?s disease and, more importantly, may be the key to discovering novel strategies to prevent neuronal degeneration in these conditions.

Funded Activity Details

Start Date: 01-01-2000

End Date: 01-01-2004

Funding Scheme: NHMRC Project Grants

Funding Amount: $390,326.00

Funder: National Health and Medical Research Council

Research Topics

ANZSRC Field of Research (FoR)

Medical microbiology not elsewhere classified

ANZSRC Socio-Economic Objective (SEO)

There are no SEO codes available for this funding activity

Other Keywords

Alzheimer's disease | Head injury | Nerve injury | Neurodegenerative diseases | Traumatic brain injury | functional genomics | neuronal cytoskeleton | neuronal injury | traumatic brain injury

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