The Alzheimer 3Ï€ project will provide the first global analysis of disease.
-a multidisciplinary team of researchers, led by UPM and the CSIC will develop microscopic maps of the brain of patients affected by the disease to deal with possible treatments
-H.m. Queen Sofia has visited the facilities of the Campus of international excellence Montegancedo (UPM), where they develop the fundamentals of the Alzheimer project 3Ï€
Madrid, February of 2012.- A multidisciplinary team of researchers, led by the Universidad Politécnica de Madrid (UPM) and the Superior Council of scientific research (CSIC)It will provide the first global analysis of Alzheimer’s.
The project, called Alzheimer 3Ï€, has as main objective the creation of microscopic maps of the brain full of people affected by the disease.
To search for new ways of addressing this dementia, which Spain affects approximately 650,000 people, scientists develop maps comprising detailed information on clinical, genetic, molecular, functional and pathological aspects. The conclusions of the work will make cross-sectional studies, simulate and recreate models of disease to deal with possible treatments.
Scientists have detailed the last Thursday, February 23, some of the fundamental aspects of the project to h.m. the Queen Dona Sofia, which has toured the facilities of the Campus of excellence international de Montegancedo of the UPM, which carried out the fundamental aspects of the Alzheimer project 3Ï€. His visit is part of the collaboration agreement signed last October 20 between the Foundation Reina SofÃa, the CSIC, UPM and the Association National the Alzheimer’s (AFALcontigo) with the aim of promoting research in neurodegenerative diseases, with special application to this dementia. Sofia was accompanied by the Minister of health, social services and equality, Ana Mato, the rector of UPM, Javier Uceda, and President of the CSIC, Emilio Lora-Tamayo.
Also was attended by the Minister of education and employment of the community of Madrid, LucÃa Figar; the Secretary of State for research, development and innovation, Carmen Vela; the President of the Fundación Reina Sofia, Arturo Coello; and the Chairperson of AFALcontigo, Blanca Clavijo, among other authorities.
The first step is the development of computational tools to create a Bank of data with clinical, epidemiological, functional information and neuroimaging, through integrated information systems ”, has detailed the researcher at the CSIC UPM and Alzheimer 3Ï€, Felipe Javier project director.
According to De Felipe, who works in the Cajal lab circuits Corticales of the Centre of biomedical technology (UPM) and in the Cajal Institute (CSIC), the design of new methods and technologies for the development of a specific software that allows to manage, consult and sail an interactive and user-friendly way this vademecum of digital and integrated multimodal information ” is another from the steps of the project.
technological deployment
Alzheimer 3π has the structure and human and technical resources of the Blue Brain Project (Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale of Lausanne, Switzerland), called in Spain Cajal Blue Brain project, whose purpose is to perform reverse engineering of the brain to understand its operation and analyze how is altered to various diseases. The biomedical technology centre, supercomputing and visualization of Madrid Center and the center of Integral automation of the UPM, and the Cajal Institute of the CSIC hosting most of the premises where the project is carried out.
The technological resources used in Alzheimer 3Ï€, among the five-sided virtual reality cave ”, developed by UPM and T-Systems, which will make it possible to reproduce the evolution of the disease through 3D simulations; Magerit ”, a supercomputer capable of recreating the brain in a virtual way with a power peak of calculation of 103,4 TeraFlops (103.400.000.000.000 operations per second); the Cajal laboratory of Corticales circuits, with the microscope Cross Beam NEON 40 EsB of Zeiss, which performs serial reconstructions of the brain at the ultrastructural level automatically; and the laboratory of cognitive neuroscience and computational of the Center for biomedical technology at the UPM, which has one of the two magnetoencefalógrafos which are Spain and measured directly and non-invasive neural activity in the brain.
