Brain Energetics

With the addition of new brain energetics equipment in the Charles E. Fipke Integrated Neuroimaging Suite at the UBC Djavad Mowafaghian Centre for Brain Health, funding for this project will allow for new procedures to be created. Assisting researchers in learning how to use the new scanning equipment is vital as the study of brain energetics is dependent on it.  

June 2023 Update: As of July 2023, we have successfully recruited 15 subjects as healthy controls, six exercising PD participants, 7 non-exercising PD participants that have completed the cycling intervention & follow-up scans, and five non-exercising PD participants for the control group.

Furthermore, we are excited about our collaboration with the upcoming IMPACT 360 study, which will investigate the effects of lifestyle choices on PD progression and provide an opportunity for data pooling and potentially increase the number of subjects in our study. To learn more, read the 2023 Impact Report here.

Purpose of the Project and Using New Technology  

Dr. Vesna Sossi will be heading the bioenergetics project which examines brain energetics in healthy aging and Parkinson’s disease. The new technology will also allow the research team to examine the effects of exercise and how it alters the bioenergetics of Parkinson’s disease.  

At the center of this project is examining the effects of exercise, and its links to bioenergetics, neuroinflammation, somatotopy, and mood and apathy. The new technology will allow researchers to answer these questions, and most importantly, to assess the therapeutic potential for exercise in subjects at high risk.  

This Brain Energetics project will create protocols and procedures on how to use the new equipment, enabling the research team to gain insights previously unexplored. To learn more about this project, read the 2023 Impact Report here. You can support this project by donating now.  

Dr. Vesna Sossi is a nuclear physicist specializing in the application of Positron Emission Tomography scans to the study of Parkinson’s Disease. Dr. Sossi is the Director of UBC’s PET Imaging Laboratory and is a professor in UBC’s Department of Physics and Astronomy.