Professor Ellie Tzima has been awarded a highly competitive European Research Council (ERC) Synergy Grant to investigate the enigmatic neurovascular interface of peripheral nerves – a critical but poorly understood junction between the nervous and vascular systems.
The University of Oxford team will collaborate with three leading European scientists: Dr Dario Bonanomi, a neuroscientist at Ospedale San Raffaele in Italy; Dr Isabelle Brunet, a vascular biologist at the Collège de France; and Dr Tambet Teesalu, a nanoscientist at the University of Tartu in Estonia. Together, this international consortium will combine complementary expertise in neuroscience, vascular biology, and nanotechnology to unravel the mechanisms that coordinate communication between nerves and blood vessels.
The neurovascular interface is one of the least understood frontiers in human biology. We are only just beginning to appreciate how closely blood vessels and nerves communicate in order to maintain tissue health. This ERC Synergy Grant provides an exceptional opportunity to bring together diverse expertise and resources across Europe to understand how these systems interact and what happens when that dialogue breaks down.
- Professor Ellie Tzima
The Oxford component of the project will focus on the cells which form the inner lining of blood and lymphatic vessels (endothelial cells), how they sense and respond to mechanical forces, and the role that this plays in the neurovascular interface. Professor Tzima's group will combine molecular, biophysical and imaging approaches to explore how these mechanical cues regulate nerve–vessel interactions. They will investigate how the disruption of these interactions may contribute to peripheral neuropathies, a group of debilitating conditions that affect millions of people worldwide.
The new consortium will establish a cross-disciplinary network at the interface of neurobiology, vascular science, and mechanobiology, aiming to generate insights that could open new therapeutic avenues for neurovascular and neuromuscular disorders.
ERC Synergy Grants support small teams of leading investigators addressing ambitious scientific questions that cannot be tackled by a single group. It is one of the most prestigious and competitive funding awards in Europe. This year, 712 proposals were submitted and one in ten were selected for funding.