Lundbeck Foundation and Novo Nordisk Foundation Body-Brain Interdisciplinary Projects

Funding for Danish and European researchers to undertake collaborative interdisciplinary research projects to enhance understanding of the interactions between the nervous system disorders and cardiovascular disease

The Novo Nordisk Foundation and Lundbeck Foundation have launched a joint call to support Body-Brain Interdisciplinary Projects that seek to enhance mechanistic understanding of body-brain interactions, specifically the relationship between nervous system disorders (NSD) and cardiometabolic disease (CMD).

While significant associations between CMDs and NSDs have been documented, the underlying mechanisms involved are largely unknown. To better understand the complex body-brain interactions that can influence health and disease, the Novo Nordisk Foundation and Lundbeck Foundation are seeking to foster a collaborative European research effort to address critical knowledge gaps that spans neuroscientific and cardiometabolic research fields while integrating multiple research disciplines.

The Body-Brain Interdisciplinary Projects call invites proposals for high quality, collaborative interdisciplinary research projects, involving researchers at Danish and European research institutions, that aim to lead to novel discoveries ultimately improving diagnosis, prevention, treatment, and understanding of these interconnected health issues. 

Research themes could include, for example:

• Physiological modulators:
  • Studying how physiological modulators such as sex, age, physiological transitions (eg puberty, menopause), circadian rhythms and sleep impact both metabolic and neural functions.
  • Projects might also investigate lifestyle factors like exercise, diet, environmental exposures (expo-some), and genetic influences on these interactions.
• Bi-directional signalling pathways:
  • Investigating the mechanisms of communication between the brain and peripheral organs, including both neuronal (wired) pathways and non-neuronal (hormonal or immune-mediated) signalling.
  • Research is crucial for understanding how the brain influences metabolic processes and how metabolic states affect brain function.
• Nervous system (neuro)circuits:
  • Dissecting functional neuronal connectivity and molecular expression patterns to understand how genetically characterised neurocircuits are modulated by various physiological states or disease conditions.
  • Research could reveal how central and peripheral neural circuits regulate metabolism and vice versa.
• Biological barriers:
  • Examining how the blood-brain barrier and gut barrier regulate body-brain interactions.
  • Research could investigate how these barriers are affected by metabolic states or disease conditions and how their integrity influences communication between the brain and peripheral organs in diseases impacting both metabolism and brain health.
• Health and disease mechanisms:
  • Exploring links between health and disease and their mechanisms using various model systems, such as animal models or human cohorts.
  • Projects could identify disease subtypes, reasons for differential treatment responses, common pathological drivers, and modulators of co-morbidity, to enable development of targeted therapeutic approaches.

Strong projects will be of a collaborative nature, bridging different research disciplines (eg neuroscience, metabolism, endocrinology, physiology, neurology, psychiatry, medicine, epidemiology, immunology, nutrition), with a unifying aim of improving mechanistic understanding of body-brain interactions in health and/or disease while addressing specific knowledge gaps.

Project proposals should specifically seek to address aims that can only be achieved through integrated, interdisciplinary, and collaborative efforts.