News

May 2023 – The European Stroke Organisation Conference ESOC 2023 opened with a public awareness campaign and proceeded with an extensive scientific programme including the presentation of large international trials in plenaries, workshops, teaching courses and other formats. ISD researchers served as the local hosts and also presented results >>

May 2023 – Small vessel disease (SVD) accounts for ~25% of strokes, more than doubles the risk of future stroke, and contributes to up to 45% of dementia cases. In 2013, STandards for ReportIng Vascular Changes on nEuroimaging 1 (STRIVE-1) categorised features of SVD that are visible on structural MRI and defined standards on multiple levels up to reporting. In an international effort with other experts ISD investigators now updated guidance on imaging of vascular changes in studies of ageing and neurodegeneration to create STRIVE-2 >>

May 2023 – The 3rd edition of "The EMBO Workshop on Stroke-Immunology" will take place from September 18 to 21, 2023 at Schloss Hohenkammer in the iconic country side of Munich. The meeting provides a unique environment for scientists at all career levels to access recent advances in the rapidly evolving field of stroke and neuroimmunology research and to expand on collaborations. >>

March 2023 – The DFG awarded an Emmy Noether Award to Marios Georgakis for establishing an independent junior research group focusing on the inflammatory mechanisms driving atheroprogression. His team will analyze high-dimensional data aiming to discover novel anti-inflammatory drug targets for cardiovascular disease, map molecular and histological immunophenotypes associated with atheroprogression, and uncover imaging and circulating biomarkers of human atheroinflammation >>

March 2023 – The first biannual network meeting will be held on March 26-28, 2023 in New York City. Principal Investigators will present their research programs while also giving Early Career Investigators an opportunity to introduce their work. The International Network of Excellence on Brain Endothelium: A Nexus for Cerebral Small Vessel Disease (BRENDA) is coordinated by Martin Dichgans and Frank Faraci (Iowa) and funded by the Leducq Foundation >>

January 2023 – The Hertie Foundation will continue funding for its Network of Excellence in Clinical Neuroscience. The program provides support to junior scientists (four from LMU and TUM) and facilitates collaborations across participating sites. The scientific focus of the Munich site (Speakers: M. Dichgans and Thomas Korn) is on neurovascular, neurodegenerative, and neuroinflammatory diseases and their underlying mechanisms. >>

December 2022 – The European Commission will fund 14 Transnational Research Projects on CVD - among them 4 Networks with participation of ISD researchers: BiotaBB (Coordinator: C. Benakis), VasOx (Coordinator: N. Plesnila), MeniSPYs (PI: A. Liesz), and MatriSVDs (PI: Martin Dichgans). These networks focus on the role of microbiota and the blood brain-barrier, oxidative stress, the meninges, and the microvascular matrisome in stroke and neurovascular disease >>

December 2022 – Identifying subtle tissue changes at disease initiation or characterizing the molecular perturbations that trigger disease progression remains difficult in animal models or post-mortem human organs. To address this challenge, ISD investigators developed DISCO-MS, a 3D spatial-omics technology that combines methods of tissue clearing with cutting edge AI, robotics and proteomics technologies. They applied DISCO-MS to an Alzheimer’s disease mouse model and to atherosclerotic plaques in the human heart to identify spatial-molecular maps. >>

November 2022 – Of the world’s population of scientists and social scientists, Highly Cited Researchers™ are 1 in 1,000. The current list from Clarivate identifies researchers who demonstrated significant influence in their chosen field or fields through the publication of multiple highly cited papers during the last decade. Their names are drawn from publications that rank in the top 1% by citations for field and publication year in the Web of Science™ citation index. >>

October 2022 – Among the hallmarks of brain aging is a decline in white matter volume and function. Using scRNA-seq, the Gokce and Simons labs characterized age-related oligodendrocyte and microglial states. They identified a population of interferon-responsive oligodendrocytes (IRO) and microglia (IRM) that localize near CD8+ T cells in white matter. Lack of CD8+ T cells prevented age-related cell loss in white matter. Their findings unravel a so-far unknown role of the adaptive immune system during brain aging >>

October 2022 – A rapid immune response to signals released from pathogens and injuries is critical for maintaining tissue integrity and restoring homeostasis. This response is largely mediated by the concerted action of pattern recognition receptors. Such cooperativity has been described for Toll like receptors (TLRs) and the NLRP3 inflammasome, but the underlying molecular mechanisms remain elusive. ISD investigators now demonstrate that IKKβ binds NLRP3 providing a shortcut to inflammasome activation for rapid immune responses >>

October 2022 – The German Research Foundation (DFG) has decided to fund the DFG Research Unit "ImmunoStroke: From Immune Cells to Stroke Recovery“ with 4.6 Million € for a second funding period of 3 years. The consortium is coordinated by Arthur Liesz and spans across 4 German universities, bringing together researchers in Munich, Hamburg, Essen and Münster >>