Grant: Project Grant

Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) is a major health problem worldwide. Most TBIs are mild and include sport-related concussion. Although many concussion studies show that complex rotational head motion is associated with worse outcomes, the reasons why are not understood. Our project aims to fill this gap by determining how head motion during impact relates to concussion diagnosis using studies in mice and in humans. In mice, we will deliver impact to the back (sagittal impact) or side (lateral impact) of the head, and measure how the head moves during these impacts using high-speed cameras. We will next test how sagittal and lateral impacts lead to changes in blood biomarkers or brain scans using the same tests that are used in human studies. We will also employ state of the art methods to examine the entire mouse brain in 3D to understand how sagittal compared to lateral impacts affect brain pathology. Finally, we will measure blood biomarkers in collegiate athletes fitted with mouthguard sensors that measure impact biomechanics to relate our animal model findings to humans. The importance of this project is to learn how head motion may modify TBI outcomes, particularly biomarker data used in clinical studies.