Sunday, 06 January 2019 10:13

Berlin: Charité coordinates EU project VirtualBrainCloud to improve Alzheimer's therapy Featured

As part of the Horizon 2020 program, the EU is funding the cloud-based neuroinformatics platform VirtualBrainCloud, which is coordinated by Charité University Hospital Berlin. The aim is to improve diagnosis and therapy for patients suffering from neurodegenerative diseases using computer simulation.


VirtualBrainCloud is a follow-up of the existing international project The Virtual Brain, resulting in a simulation software. The software is a calculation program for the visualization of brain structures and functions. The scientists are now working on the extension of the existing model by adding information about molecular processes in the nerve cells.

The VirtualBrainCloud should close the gap between existing computational neuroscience and subcellular systems biology and integrate both research streams into a uniform computer model, according to the EU project website.

The ultimate goal is, amongst other things, to develop a system to support the decision regarding an early diagnosis of neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer's disease. A crucial problem here is that the development of the disease in patients is individual, making individual diagnosis and therapy necessary.

The EU is contributing a total of 15 million euros to the VirtualBrainCloud project. 17 European institutions are involved.

Further information:
https://cordis.europa.eu/project/rcn/219020/factsheet/en
https://www.thevirtualbrain.org/tvb/zwei/home