Drug repurposing in neurological disorders

Current therapies for epilepsy are symptomatic, only suppressing the symptoms (seizures), but do not impact the development or progression of disease. Many groups around the world, including ours, are testing novel therapies to impact epileptogenesis, intervening very early in epilepsy development to limit the severity of disease, with some preclinical success. Given the high attrition rates, substantial costs and slow pace of new drug discovery and development, repurposing of 'old' drugs to treat both common and rare diseases is increasingly becoming an attractive proposition because it involves the use of de-risked compounds, with potentially lower overall development costs and shorter development timelines. Various data-driven and experimental approaches have been suggested for the identification of repurposable drug candidates; however, there are also major technological and regulatory challenges that need to be addressed. For this project, you will be using a state-of-the-art multi-omics (bioinformatic analyses of genes, RNA, proteins, metabolism, microbiota) to select the potential targets for drug repurposing in epilepsy, traumatic brain injury and stroke. Skills to learn project 1: Small animal handling and neurosurgery (electrode implantations), animal models of traumatic brain injury, temporal lobe epilepsy and genetic epilepsy, behavioural neuroscience, magnetic resonance imagining, interpretation and analysis. Positron emission tomography interpretation and analysis. Molecular techniques (gene expression, protein, metabolic and microbiome analyses). Animal studies are optional, depending of the candidate. Bioinformatics - analysis of genomics, transcriptomcis, proteomics, metabolomcis Potential: Translation of the project to patients in the clinic