German Research Foundation (DFG) approves new Collaborative Research Centre at the University Medical Center Göttingen (UMG) with more than twelve million euros.
The German Research Foundation (DFG) will fund a new Collaborative Research Centre (CRC) led by the University Medical Center Göttingen (UMG) from 1 April 2025. The new CRC 1690, entitled “Disease Mechanisms and Functional Restoration of Sensory and Motor Systems”, will receive more than twelve million euros for an initial funding period of just under four years. Prof. Dr. Tobias Moser, Director of the Institute for Auditory Neuroscience at the UMG and MBExC spokesperson, is the spokesperson of the CRC 1690. The new CRC aims to improve existing therapies for patients with sensory and motor impairments and to find new treatment approaches. As sensory and motor activities in the nervous system are closely intertwined, a better understanding of the precise processing of this information in the brain and the underlying disease mechanisms at the molecular and cellular level is required.
“We want to exploit the potential of newly developed methods and transfer them into clinical application, as well as develop new strategies to restore impaired sensory and motor processes in affected patients. We will use a combination of state-of-the-art methods from genetics, physiology and anatomy to investigate disease mechanisms of the eye and ear in particular. We expect to unravel both common and organ-specific mechanisms, with great potential for synergy by learning from the similarities and differences between the organs we work with. The development of innovative therapies includes gene therapies, optogenetic therapies, in which gene therapies and optical medical technology are combined, as well as stem cell-based therapies for diseases of the eye, larynx, ear and spinal cord and for the loss of the hand or arm,” says CRC spokesperson Prof. Dr. Tobias Moser, Director of the Institute for Auditory Neuroscience at the UMG and group leader at the Max Planck Institute for Multidisciplinary Natural Sciences and the German Primate Center – Leibniz Institute for Primate Research.
On the one hand, disease mechanisms based on genetic, age-related and immunological disorders of the inner ear and the retina in the eye will be deciphered. On the other hand, a deeper understanding of the disorders will allow the development of new therapeutic approaches to restore the affected sensory and motor systems. For example, two subprojects of the CRC at the UMG are investigating the consequences of mutations in the OTOF gene. The OTOF gene is responsible for the production of the protein otoferlin. Otoferlin is involved in the transmission of sound information from the hair cells in the inner ear to the auditory nerve. If otoferlin is missing or its function is impaired, the sound information cannot be transmitted to the auditory centre in the brain. Those affected become deaf. One of the sub-projects will investigate how different mutations in the OTOF gene affect the structure of otoferlin. The other will investigate how such mutations affect the function of the protein and lead to hearing loss. The new knowledge will be used to develop optimised gene therapies for deafness caused by mutations in OTOF.
In addition to the UMG, the University of Göttingen, the Max Planck Institutes for Dynamics and Self-Organisation and Multidisciplinary Sciences, the German Primate Center – Leibniz Institute for Primate Research, the German Center for Neurodegenerative Diseases in Bonn and the University of Freiburg are also involved.
FURTHER INFORMATIONEN
About the Institute for Auditory Neuroscience
Link to the DFG Press release (in German)
Contact:
University Medical Center Göttingen, University Göttingen
Institute for Auditory Neuroscience
Prof. Dr. Tobias Moser
Robert-Koch-Straße 40, 37075 Göttingen
Phone 0551 / 39-63071
tobias.moser[at]med.uni-goettingen.de
