After obtaining my Ph.D. in Neurobiology at the Universiteit van Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands in 1985, I have published more than 100 peer reviewed full-length papers. My postdoctoral trainings were in neuroanatomy and in behavioral analysis. My research focuses on three projects, 1) on the role of Aβ production and clearance in Alzheimer’s disease and 2) the role of hypertension, blood vessels and inflammation in this process, and 3) the general aging process. My first research line is primarily focused on the use of therapeutic agents (e.g., amyloid β binding peptides and/or dietary intervention) that may be promising in the alleviation or delay of age-related neural and cognitive changes. My second research interest is in the role of vascular pathology in Alzheimer’s disease, especially the relation between white matter infarcts and AD pathology. Finally, we are studying the relation between increased Aβ pathology, inflammation and synaptic pathology. Currently, our research focus in on the role of Aβ oligomers in the development of Alzheimer’s disease pathology and cognitive deficits. Our data indicate that reducing the level of Aβ oligomers in the brain reduces Alzheimer’s disease cognitive deficits. My expertise is in Alzheimer’s disease-related and aging-related neurodegeneration and neuropathology in the brain. Furthermore, I have extensive rodent behavioral expertise, both in my own experiments with a focus on cognition, and since I have been the Technical Director of the UAB Behavioral Assessment Core for the last 9 years. In these years we have expanded the core from two rooms to fourteen rooms, with a concomitant increase in behavioral/cognitive tests that are available. Thus, my lab is well positioned to do animal behavioral/cognitive assessments, including neurological deficit analysis, spatial and non-spatial learning and memory tests, and the analysis of circadian activity, including eating, drinking and sleeping patterns.

Neuroscience, Brain Research, Advance Alzheimer Research and Treatment, Brain and Behaviour