NYHETER 2020-11-25

I årets utlysning av fakultetens strategisk forskningsresurs tilldelas bl.a. Anders Wåhlin forskningsanslag, på 700 000 kronor/år i tre år.

Anders ska kortfattat utveckla metoder för att studera hur funktionen i blodkärl i hjärnan påverkas när man åldras och hur det kan påverka hjärnans funktion. 

Här kan ni läsa den engelska samanfattningen:
"Microvascular damage in the brain is emerging as a central cause of cognitive decline and dementia in aging. Such damage may develop as a consequence of aberrant cardiac-related pulsatile forces transmitted to distal vasculature due to age-related vascular stiffening (Wåhlin & Nyberg 2019). Our hypothesis is that the ability of small vessels to adjust flow to local metabolic needs becomes impaired when these vessels are exposed to excessive pulsatility. This in turn leads to episodes of ischemia and ultimately neurodegeneration. To really understand this mechanism, however, it’s crucial to develop techniques to actually measure the arterial hemodynamics deep in the brain's small blood vessels. The purpose of this project is to develop magnetic resonance imaging techniques to investigate deep cerebral arterial pulsatility, and through these methods take the next step and study if exposure to a high degree of pulsatility can cause capillary breakdown as well as impaired neurovascular coupling (the ability of the cerebral microcirculation to respond to increased metabolic needs). Finally, we will use state of the art mapping of the brain’s functional organization to uncover if excessive pulsatility in deep cerebral arteries is linked to similar types of dysfunctions as those that are reliably observed with aging and in dementia. The project extends over four years and will be performed by a group of researchers in biomedical engineering, neurology and neuroscience."