Neuropathology

Professor Nigel Leigh, Professor Chris Miller, Professor Christopher Shaw, Dr Ammar Al- Chalabi and Professor Steve Williams are part of a recently funded European Network of Excellence. A postdoctoral fellow will shortly be appointed to work on axonal transport alongside Professor Miller’s team. Professor Leigh and Dr Safa Al-Sarraj (working with research fellow Dr Satomi Maekawa and colleagues) have recently shown that both pyramidal neurons and GABAergic interneurons are lost in motor and extramotor areas in MND. This throws light on neuroimaging studies, which show extensive extramotor involvement, targeting particularly the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex and anterior cingulate cortex. These findings help to explain the mechanisms underlying the executive dysfunction so commonly observed in neuropsychological studies of MND, including their own led by Dr Lara Goldstein and Dr Sharon Abrahams. In collaboration with Dr Janice Robertson (University of Toronto) they are now investigating new aspects of tau pathology in MND.