Cerebrovascular disease like stroke is a leading cause of death and disability and is a major socioeconomic problem. While significant progress has been made to understand the pathophysiological mechanism underlying these diseases using cell culture and animal models, surmountable challenges persist in translational research owing to the genetic makeup of individuals, species-specific differences, heterogeneity, and co-morbid conditions that are often evident in the clinical setting.
Our group is interested in leveraging human induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) to model clinically relevant systems to study human brain disorders. To this end, we employ various strategies and engineered techniques to obtain a perfusable 3D model system (organoids) that can be implanted into the murine brain for long-term survival and maturation. Using this system, we are trying to gain mechanistic insight into the response of human endothelial, neuronal, and glial cells under the condition of ischemia and therapeutic intervention. We use various biochemical and molecular biology techniques, behavioral assessment, and live imaging to validate our study.
We believe that the work carried out in our lab will also open new directions for research in other neurodegenerative diseases.
Hiramani Dhungana
Academy Research Fellow
P.O. Box 63, FI-00014 University of Helsinki
Phone: +358
Email: hiramani.dhungana@helsinki.fi