Tanrada pansuwan
I am interested in understanding disease progression in neurodegenerative tauopathies, specifically relating changes at molecular level to whole-brain level. My PhD project aims to investigate neuropathological changes from post-mortem data, understand how they relate to in vivo markers of structural and functional brain networks and how changes in brain networks influence clinical syndromes. Imaging markers can aid diagnosis, but their specificity is still debatable. Neuropathological measures provide the golden standard for definite diagnosis but can only be done at post-mortem autopsy. It is therefore crucial to investigate the interplay between these markers to fully understand the progression of tau associated neurodegenerative pathology in the brain. This will hopefully shed light on relevant biomarkers of tauopathies and improve specificity of imaging markers. My work also involves building computational models to test various hypotheses of tau spread and regional susceptibility.
Currently, I am working on a project that aims to use quantitative pathology to assess neuropathological changes and relate those measures to structural changes on MRI scans drawn from patients with progressive supranuclear palsy.