Acquired Epilepsies
Dr. Varvel’s team found that using a drug to reduce the invasion of monocytes from the blood into the brain minimized the harmful effects of status epilepticus, such as a loss in functional impairment and inflammation.
Post-Traumatic Epilepsy
The PTE Initiative has led to many scientific successes to date: PTE Initiative teams developed and characterized several different laboratory-based models of PTE, enhanced the understanding of the biological underpinnings of PTE, and identified potential risk factors and potential biomarkers for PTE.
Acquired Epilepsies
This work is instrumental not only to understand why and how the brain generates and sustains seizures, but also to discover biomarkers that could predict if someone will have seizures, or how they may respond to a drug.
Genetics, Mechanisms
Three recent CURE Epilepsy grants awardees have contributed to numerous aspects of genetic epilepsies ranging from the development and application of new technology to study epilepsy genetics, to studying specific genes and their contributions to epilepsy, to exploring the epigenomic pattern associated with epilepsy.
Infantile Spasms
This work positions PV + INs as a potential target to treat IS, and perhaps even offers avenues for timely diagnosis.
Tech/AI
Researchers are continuing their work to develop cutting-edge implantable devices to understand and treat epilepsy at their own laboratories.
Infantile Spasms, Mechanisms
Dr. Swann’s work as part of the IS Initiative is one example of how strategic, long-term investment in basic research can advance our knowledge by leaps and bounds.
SUDEP
We highlight three Taking Flight awardees who received grants for diverse projects, ranging from work on sudden unexpected death in epilepsy (SUDEP) to mapping epileptic brain networks, to an exploration of circadian function as a potential mechanism and a therapeutic target for epilepsy.
The study also shows the importance of looking at trio data, as in this case, it led to the reclassification of several genetic variants. SUDP is a particularly difficult condition to study because unfortunately, a genetic condition may never have been diagnosed or suspected.
