Our laboratory studies immune and injury responses in aging and neurodegeneration. A growing body of information in recent years has documented the interchangeability of key proteins between the immune and central nervous systems (CNS). One prominent example, and a focus of our lab, is TGF-β1 which is a key regulator of immune functions but is also necessary for neuronal protection and survival and may have a role in Alzheimer’s disease. Another group of proteins we are interested in constitutes the complement system, which is critical in the removal of pathogens and dying cells not only in the periphery, but likely in the CNS as well. In a less biased approach, we use proteomics to study cellular communication on a larger scale in plasma and relate it to aging and degenerative changes in the CNS.
The lab in October 2008
In much of our studies we seek to understand neurodegeneration and neurological disease in the context of immune responses. One exciting hypothesis is that altered or failing immune responses might underlie or at least contribute to age-related degenerative diseases of the nervous system. We use mouse genetics, behavior, cell culture, and proteomic approaches to try to test this hypothesis.