Center of Biomedical Research Excellence in CNS Metabolism

中枢神经系统（CNS）代谢和神经元兴奋性是相互依赖的，因此CNS 新陈代谢是认知、记忆和行为的生化基础。中枢神经系统的失调与 许多疾病，包括阿尔茨海默病，癫痫，帕金森病和脑损伤，但 CNS代谢和疾病之间的机制联系知之甚少。大学 肯塔基州（英国）医学院在过去几年中对研究人员进行了大量投资 代谢和代谢组学专业知识和仪器，以支持他们的研究工作， 加强了在神经科学、癌症、心血管、糖尿病和肥胖症研究方面的现有优势。 因此，英国建议建立一个独特的多学科生物医学研究卓越中心（COBRE） CNS代谢（CNS-Met）作为一个战略性设计的可持续框架， 研究集中在脑功能和疾病的代谢介质的作用。拟议 跨学科中心利用葡萄糖生物学，神经元信号， 线粒体代谢，系统神经科学和数据科学以及先进的 代谢组学和成像能力，以创建一个集中在中枢神经系统的综合研究框架 新陈代谢.总体目标是通过提供一个 以专题为重点的可持续多学科基础设施， 代谢对中枢神经系统功能和神经系统疾病的影响，并利用这一新的平台开发有前途的， 在中枢神经系统研究的一个令人兴奋的和有影响力的领域的高技能，早期研究人员。完成 在这些目标中，我们将实现四个具体目标：（1）培养足够数量的受资助研究人员， 与COBRE的统一主题直接相关的计划;（2）提供强大的基于团队的指导， 基础和临床专业知识;（3）在神经病学的多学科领域招募新的COBRE研究人员 通过试点项目拨款和招聘初级研究项目负责人的功能障碍;（4）创建 通过与英国强大的研究中心和核心设施的关键联系，实现研究项目之间的协同作用，包括 现有的COBR。将通过三个研究项目、一个行政项目和一个技术合作项目， 核心，代谢组学的关键研究核心，所有这些都由强大的生物统计学/生物信息学支持联系在一起， 这对拟议的研究至关重要，并将有助于开发机构资源。的 三个研究项目的科学重点是脑代谢与神经系统疾病的相互作用， 跨越基础和翻译的视角。这种多学科专业知识的集中， 广泛认可但研究不足的神经系统疾病的代谢机制有望带来重要的新 全面了解CNS代谢。CNS-Met将创造一批熟练的科学家， 我们有能力领导一个可持续的研究中心，专注于中枢神经系统代谢的未来。

Central nervous system (CNS) metabolism and neuronal excitability are interdependent, and so CNS metabolism is the biochemical basis of cognition, memory, and behavior. Dysregulation of CNS is implicated in numerous disorders, including Alzheimer’s Disease, epilepsy, Parkinson’s disease, and brain injury, but the mechanistic connections between CNS metabolism and disease are poorly understood. The University of Kentucky (UK) College of Medicine has made significant investments over the last few years in investigators with metabolic and metabolomics expertise and instrumentation to support their research efforts, which has enhanced existing strengths in neuroscience, cancer, cardiovascular, and diabetes and obesity research. Thus, UK proposes to establish a unique multidisciplinary Center of Biomedical Research Excellence (COBRE) on CNS Metabolism (CNS-Met) as a strategically designed, sustainable framework that promotes leading-edge research focused on the role of metabolic mediators of brain function and disease. The proposed interdisciplinary center leverages highly specialized expertise in glucose biology, neuronal signaling, mitochondrial metabolism, systems neuroscience, and data sciences as well as the presence of advanced metabolomics and imaging capabilities to create an integrated research framework focused on CNS metabolism. The overarching goals are to strengthen UK’s neuroscience research enterprise by providing a thematically focused and sustainable multidisciplinary infrastructure dedicated to defining the contribution of metabolism to CNS function and neurological diseases and to use this novel platform to develop promising and highly-skilled, early-stage investigators in an exciting and impactful area of CNS research. To accomplish these goals, we will meet four specific aims: (1) Develop a critical mass of funded investigators with research programs directly related to the COBRE’s unifying theme; (2) provide strong team-based mentoring combining basic and clinical expertise; (3) recruit new investigators to the COBRE in multidisciplinary areas of neurologic dysfunction through pilot project grant and recruitment of junior Research Project Leaders; and (4) create synergy among research projects via critical links to strong research centers and core facilities at UK, including existing COBREs. Emerging synergies will be developed through three research projects, an Administrative Core, a critical research core in Metabolomics, all linked by strong biostatistics/bioinformatics support, all of which are critical to the proposed studies and will contribute to the development of institutional resources. The scientific focus of the three research projects are brain metabolism interactions with neurological disease, spanning basic and translational perspectives. This concentration of multidisciplinary expertise focused on widely recognized yet understudied metabolic mechanisms of neurological diseases promises significant new understandings of CNS metabolism overall. The CNS-Met will create a critical mass of skilled scientists who are well equipped to lead a sustainable research center focused on CNS metabolism into the future.