Aarhus University Seal / Aarhus Universitets segl

Leif Østergaard is awarded a Lundbeck Professorship

Professor and head of CFIN, Leif Østergaard has been awarded DKK 40 mio. from the Lundbeck Foundation’s Professorship program. Over the next 6 years, the Lundbeck Professorship grant will allow him to examine the role of capillaries – the brain’s smallest blood vessels – in healthy aging and in the development of dementia.

09.12.2019 | Henriette Blæsild Vuust

Professor Leif Østergaard

The brain relies on a steady supply of oxygen via the blood stream to provide energy for its many functions. Reductions in the brains blood supply can therefore cause neurological symptoms and tissue injury, for example in acute stroke, where a blood clots may occlude one of the brain’s major arteries.

Leif Østergaards research program, BRAIN COMET, will examine whether capillary flow disturbances also limit brain tissue’s access to oxygen reductions in blood supply, capillary flow disturbances cannot be detected by current techniques, but CFINs research suggests that such disturbances may develop over decades and contribute to the development of diseases, including dementia.

The grant will allow Leif Østergaard’s research team to develop and validate methods to detect capillary dysfunction and examine the importance of this overlooked vascular disease phenomenon in aging and dementia. The team hopes their research will ultimately result in new strategies to prevent, diagnose, and treat some of the disease changes that contribute to age-related cognitive decline, reducing the number of citizens who develop dementia.


For more information, please contact:

Leif Østergaard
LEIF@CFIN.AU.DK
Professor
Aarhus University Hospital
Neuroradiology Research Unit
Department of Neuroradiology

Aarhus University
Department of Clinical Medicine
Center of Functionally Integrative Neuroscience (CFIN)


Read more about the Lundbeck Foundation Professorships at:
https://www.lundbeckfonden.com/en/six-brain-professors-receive-dkk-232-million/

Bevillinger og priser, Sundhed og sygdom, Alle grupper, CFIN, CFIN, Forskning