FOR 2879: ImmunoStroke: From the immune cell to stroke regeneration
- Speaker: Dr. Arthur Liesz
- Affiliation: Institute for Stroke and Dementia Research (ISD)
- Support: since 2019
Ischemic stroke is the leading cause of long-term disability and the third leading cause of death in industrialized countries. Current treatment options for stroke are limited, and preclinical trial results often fail in clinical trials. Therefore, there is a new need for innovative approaches with translational potential to develop effective therapeutic strategies. Although the development of local inflammatory processes in the ischemic brain is a well-known phenomenon, it is not yet well understood how these immune processes are related to secondary infarct progression and what role the immune system plays in poststroke regeneration. Interestingly, although cerebral ischemia has not traditionally been considered a classic neuroinflammatory disease, stroke triggers a plethora of immune responses similar to those seen in autoimmune diseases of the brain. Furthermore, the acute brain injury associated with stroke has a strong effect on the peripheral immune system and triggers a multiphasic immune response. The interaction between immunological responses and brain injury is poorly understood, particularly with respect to the mechanisms underlying recovery from stroke. The ImmunoStroke research group, funded by DFG since 2019, focuses on studying the role of immunity in repair mechanisms and long-term recovery after stroke. The projects described for renewal of this consortium in the second funding period will i) investigate how chronic neuroinflammation modulates recovery after stroke; ii) clarify the role of neuroinflammation in stroke patients; and iii) identify novel markers of neuroinflammation after stroke. These goals will be achieved by using state-of-the-art technologies and novel treatment paradigms to understand and modulate the immune responses that occur after experimental stroke. This will be supported by highly standardized preclinical experiments, validation of key outcomes in multicenter preclinical RCTs, and validation of experiments by analyses in stroke patients.
Source: DFG Gepris