At the foundation of UK’s Neuroscience Research Priority Area (NRPA) is the belief that an environment that allows for dedicated research time and fosters teamwork also enhances problem-solving, accelerates learning, promotes creativity and builds stronger relationships, said Linda Van Eldik, PhD, NRPA co-director, co-director of KNI and director of the UK Sanders-Brown Center on Aging.
The NRPA umbrella
“The NRPA was established to offer a collaborative infrastructure and support broad-based neuroscience research across campus,” Van Eldik said. And with more than 330 faculty and 480 students and trainees across nine colleges and 42 departments participating in neuroscience research endeavors in 2024, it’s evident that collaboration is more than a concept.
Because the journey from neuroscience discovery in the lab to patient care at the bedside is a complex one, filled with plenty of obstacles, rigorous scientific validation and regulatory requirements, it makes alliances not only a benefit, but a necessity, she added.
The Neuroscience group was named a Research Priority Area by UK in 2019, and since then it has steadily raised the output of neuroscience research across campus, said Larry Goldstein, MD, codirector of KNI, chair of the Department of Neurology and NRPA co-director. “It’s all about impacting the health of the people in Kentucky and beyond,” he said.
“The NRPA is a University-wide program that takes advantage of having the health campus and Academic Medical Center located on the UK’s primary campus, facilitating wide-ranging partnerships across neuroscience-related sub-disciplines. We have fairly extensive collaborations in several areas, such as with the College of Engineering, and other Colleges such as Arts and Sciences, and Pharmacy, where we have several projects,” said Dr. Goldstein. “We even have ongoing work with the College of Agriculture related to brain health and other issues that affect the nervous system.”
Funds from small to large
Funding is essential to research, and while the premise sounds simple, it’s often the most difficult, delicate and frustrating part of navigating research. It can be particularly challenging for researchers early in their careers who are getting a project off the ground, but it can also be complicated for those building upon early studies.
“It’s just as important to not usurp or try not to control the existing and successful groups as it is to foster new teams,” Dr. Van Eldik said. “Our new teams have great ideas, but receiving NIH funds for new ideas without feasibility data rarely occurs. To stimulate innovation, the NRPA can help with seed, pilot and equipment grants. It has been a proven way to begin gathering preliminary data that will then lead to external funding and a body of work that becomes self-sustaining.”
NeuroBank’s samples crucial to research
Access to human biological samples is also essential for many research studies. UK’s NeuroBank, which falls under the NRPA, is enabling a growing body of research, having collected blood, cerebrospinal fluid, tissue, urine, saliva and buccal swabs from a total of 1,023 subjects with a variety of neurological conditions. Total samples on hand are 22,145, with more samples being donated every day, said Tritia Yamasaki, MD, PhD, Neurobank Primary Investigator.
“Our patients are really amazing,” she said. “I see Parkinson’s patients in clinic and if they are getting a blood draw and I ask if they will give a tube for research, they are like: ‘Yes, anything for research.’ Without their generosity, we wouldn’t have a NeuroBank.”
Samples have been used by researchers studying epilepsy, movement disorders, optic neuritis, intracranial hypertension, migraine, dementia and rare autoimmune conditions, among others. In addition to supplying samples to UK researchers, the NeuroBank is willing to work with outside investigators.
With its recent approval to consent healthy control subjects, the NeuroBank will advance to the next level, said Laura Muzinic, MS, NRPA project manager. “This is a huge move because when we have healthy individuals with no neurological conditions, we are widening our scope. Researchers need to compare their work to a control sample and having that healthy control group enables us to support even more work.”
Translational research bringing science to the bedside
To move research to the bedside can be a herculean task, and it’s true that most breakthroughs aren’t sudden, overnight
discoveries. They actually occur over many years, with study after study building upon the last. At UK’s Center for Advanced Translational Stroke Science (CATSS), translating science into treatment is central to its mission.
For example, a study led by Keith Pennypacker, PhD, has found that Appalachian patients who have an ischemic stroke treated with mechanical thrombectomy have different proteomic responses when compared with others.
“Appalachian patients represent 70 percent of our stroke patients,” Dr. Pennypacker said. “We know that they are more apt to have comorbidities that are stroke-related than those in non- Appalachian areas. And we have discovered that their levels of proteomic expression at the time of mechanical thrombectomy are unique. The inflammatory response is different. We are
discovering what proteins are potentially predictors of functional and cognitive deficits so that in the future we can target some of these biomarkers for pharmaceutical intervention.”
Another area at the forefront of translational research is the Brain Neurorestoration Center, under the direction of Greg Gerhardt, PhD, Craig van Horne, MD, PhD, and Randal Voss, PhD.
BRAIN (the Brain Restoration Alliance in Neurodegeneration) unites several labs in the search of methods to heal damaged nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord.
Focused on neurodegenerative disorders such as Parkinson’s disease, Huntington’s disease, movement disorders, cognitive decline and other neurodegenerative conditions, the diverse group hopes to reverse the damage these diseases cause to the brain and spinal cord.
CRU at the center of all studies
Research doesn’t occur in a bubble, nor does it stagnate, which is why the well-structured management of the KNI Clinical Research Unit (CRU, formerly known as the Clinical Research Organization) is so important, said John Slevin, MD, vice chair for research in the Department of Neurology and medical director of the KNI CRU.
Overseeing more than 60 active clinical neurology studies, as well as neurosurgical studies, the CRU is in place to assist investigators — in many ways, Dr. Slevin said. “It’s everything from making sure an investigator has a balanced portfolio so that they don’t have multiple studies recruiting from the same pool or sub-pool of patients, thereby competing against themselves, to helping them get the ball rolling with the IRB, to establishing a budget,” he said.
Put simply, Dr. Slevin said, the CRU breaks down the barriers that can often stop a researcher in their tracks before a project is off the ground. “We help with the groundwork, and we are also there to give guidance so that everything is done correctly along the way and it is as good a trial as possible.”
“It’s really an exciting time to be involved in neuroscience research,” Dr. Van Eldik said. “Our researchers, whether they are undergraduates, medical students, residents, young faculty or those with a lifetime of experience, are using innovative methods to make advances that improve the lives of those in Kentucky. I’m proud of them and optimistic about our continued growth. There is a lot of great work going on here.”
