BRAINSCAPES

The aim of BRAINSCAPES is to map in detail the biological mechanisms underlying multiple brain disorders ('brainscaping').

Recent genetic discovery studies have provided unprecedented insight into the genes involved in brain disorders. The next step is to use this knowledge for gaining mechanistic disease insight. In BRAINSCAPES we will develop novel analytic and experimental tools to study the functional consequences of risk genes on the function of specific cells, their circuits and functional output. We aim to provide insight into the molecular and cellular basis of complex brain disorders that can be used to design novel treatments.

The next step in brain related research

We won’t stop until we know it all, by using 5 complementing strategies:

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News

About the strength of consortia (part 1) January 25, 2024 - On 12 December 2023 the Annual Amsterdam Neuroscience meeting took place at the RAI Amsterdam. In the afternoon a special session was dedicated to “Consortia at work”. Different “duos” involved in large consortia explained the strength and added value of these collaborative initiatives. In this first part we highlight the talk by Prof. dr. Huib… Read More
Single-cell reference mapping to construct and extend cell-type hierarchies October 6, 2023 - Single-cell RNA-sequencing is increasingly used to map the cellular heterogeneity of complex tissues. For example, more than 300 studies profiled a total of over 44 million cells across different brain regions, ages, and species. Since different research groups usually specialize in different cell-type compartments, these datasets usually differ in terminology and annotation depth. Our understanding… Read More
In the spotlight: interview with VICI recipient Dr. Ingo Willuhn May 22, 2023 - Recently, BRAINSCAPES PI Dr. Ingo Willuhn and his team were awarded an NWO VICI grant for their research into the function of serotonin and dopamine across brain regions. While there are already quite extensive insights into the individual action of these two neuromodulators, there is little understanding of the combined effects of these two systems… Read More
Similar but not the same: generating midbrain dopaminergic neuron heterogeneity during development March 23, 2023 - In their review recently published in Nature Reviews Neuroscience, Oxana Garritsen, Eljo van Battum, Laurens Grossouw and Jeroen Pasterkamp provide a comprehensive overview of the different molecular subsets and heterogeneity of dopaminergic neurons in the ventral midbrain of mice and humans. The authors first compare the currently defined subsets and then address molecular mechanisms that… Read More
Short report of the BRAINSCAPES Career afternoon February 23, 2023 - On February 22nd a BRAINSCAPES Career afternoon was organized by our Career and Training Committee. The aim of the event was to offer our PhD students and post-doctoral researchers the opportunity to gain practical insights into different career paths after completing a PhD or post-doctoral research period. As such we invited two consortium members and… Read More
This figure summarises all the ways genetic association results for the 12 individual psychiatric disorders were annotated and the extent to which annotations shared between psychiatric disorders were identified. First, overlap in SNPs, mapped genes, and genomic loci was examined. Subsequently, gene set and gene property analyses were conducted, examining, for each of the 12 psychiatric disorders, whether the genetic signal was enriched in 9,508 gene sets, 565 cell types and 53 tissue types. Partitioned LDSC was used to test for enrichment of 61 functional genomic categories. All pictures used in this figure are illustrations and do not reflect the actual pathways identified in the analysis. Exploring the genetic overlap among twelve psychiatric disorders December 12, 2022 - In a study published in Nature Genetics, Cato Romero, Mats Nagel, and Sophie van der Sluis teamed up with colleagues from the Complex Trait Genetics department and the Million Veteran Program to scrutinize the genetic similarity of twelve psychiatric disorders. Besides identifying shared genes and biological substrates between pairs of disorders, they also elucidated the… Read More
Optimizing study designs for iPSC-based disease modelling November 28, 2022 - In a study published in Molecular Psychiatry on Nov 24th, three Brainscapes teams across two work packages worked together to optimize statistical power for iPSC-based study designs. Their analyses demonstrate that published case-control iPSC studies are generally underpowered.  Read More
BRAINSCAPES consortium day 2022 October 6, 2022 - On Friday, September 30, the BRAINSCAPES annual meeting was held in Leiden at the CORPUS congress center. Over 50 members participated in the event and well represented the 7 institutes that are involved in the project. Read More
Characterising social stress responsive ventral tegmental area neurons July 20, 2022 - Researchers from UMC Utrecht characterized neurons in the ventral tegmental area that respond to stress, paving the way for future research into the functional contribution of this population to stress-driven changes in reward processing. Read More
A map of dopamine signals across the brain June 12, 2022 - Researchers from the Netherlands Institute for Neuroscience reveal new functional insights on the dopamine signals across the brain, and publish their findings in PNAS. Read More
Brainscapes scientists identify a yet unknown neural mechanism of habit formation February 8, 2022 - Researchers from the Amsterdam UMC, and part of the Brainscapes consortium, now show findings that challenge the status quo in the field of behavioral neuroscience. Read More
Brainscapes participates in major successful brain mapping initiative October 20, 2021 - Two co-leaders of the Brainscapes consortium have contributed to successfully map the different cell types of the motor cortex and other cortical areas in the brain. Read More
New genetic causes for Alzheimer’s discovered September 21, 2021 - An international research team has conducted large-scale genetic research into the different backgrounds of the risk of Alzheimer's disease. The researchers discovered new genes and biological mechanisms that contribute to Alzheimer's disease. Read More