By 2026, we may be able to detect Parkinson’s disease early based on a personalized sleep study. And this thanks to Nap, the innovative research project coordinated by the University of Pisa and whose start is set for March 1, 2023.
Funded with three million euros by the European Union’s research and innovation program ‘Horizon Europe’ – of which 800,000 for the University of Pisa – the Nap project aims to use, for the first time in this particular field of investigation, of cerebral organoids, i.e. advanced three-dimensional cellular models of the human brain.
“Being able to identify Parkinson’s disease in time, even before the typical tremors start, is essential for controlling the disease, managing its evolution and guaranteeing the patient a better quality of life – explains Chiara Magliaro, researcher at the Department of Engineering of Information of the University of Pisa and the ‘E. Piaggio’ Research Center and project manager – With the technology that we intend to develop thanks to the Nap project, it will be possible to do it in a personalized way”.
An early diagnosis, the one aimed at by the University of Pisa, made even more important by the current lack of an effective cure for Parkinson’s. To date, in fact, the patient realizes that he has this disease only when the first tremors appear when, however, about 90% of his neurons are already compromised.
“Unlike the classic diagnostic techniques – continues Magliaro – the one we are preparing is not invasive and will allow to identify Parkinson’s disease through early screening and to understand the predisposition or otherwise of a subject to this disease which, like other neurodegenerative , has a growing impact in a society like ours, which is getting older every day”.
At the base of this new device, a revolutionary sleep survey technique that will guarantee more accurate results than those normally allowed by current survey methods. In fact, for the first time in the world, researchers at the University of Pisa will use brain organoids to mimic sleep-wake rhythms and characterize defects in the morphology of neuronal cells attributable to sleep disorders related to Parkinson’s.
The Nap project involves an international multidisciplinary consortium, with skills ranging from biomedical engineering to biotechnology, coordinated by the University of Pisa and which includes two other research institutions – the University of Freiburg (Germany) and the University of Amsterdam (Holland) – and three companies, Organotherapeutics Gmbh (Luxembourg), Atlas Neuroengineering (Belgium) and SleepActa (spin-off of the University of Pisa).