Grant: Project Grant

Stroke is a leading cause of disability and death in Canada. When the blood supply to the brain is disrupted, either regionally or globally, the nerve cells can rapidly malfunction and die. Neuronal death during stroke has several characteristic features, including loss of the cell's electrical activity and the formation of blebs in their processes (dendrites). Interestingly, nerve cells that reside outside the core of the stroke damage show blebbing in their dendritic regions that cross into the core, but may ultimately survive the insult. Here we propose that the molecular machinery responsible for bleb formation functions in a protective role. This is achieved by isolation of damaging signals (calcium) from spreading to the rest of the cell. We propose that by understanding how these traditionally damaging structures (blebs) form and potentially protect the nerve cells will form a basis for exploiting them in the future to reduce brain damage and improve recovery after stroke.