- Dr Laura Vella, Head of The Florey’s Extracellular Vesicle (EV) Lab, has spent the past 20 years understanding the role of EVs in neurodegenerative diseases, such as Alzheimer’s disease.
- Known as ‘cellular shuttles’, EVs may provide insight into cellular changes in the brain in early stages of Alzheimer’s disease.
- Dr Vella, whose grandmothers both live with dementia, believes there is more to be done in building our knowledge of the brain to provide families more answers.
“They are like bubbles that deliver cargo between cells.”
Such is the way Dr Laura Vella describes extracellular vesicles (EVs) – tiny biological nanoparticles released by all cells and organs in our body, including the brain.
Extracellular vesicles are ‘nature’s postal service’. They deliver molecular information from cell to cell and around the body, and are present in every bodily fluid – from spinal fluid to urine and blood.
Dr Vella was one of the first Australians scientists to publish in the field of EV research, an area she has been studying for the past 20 years. Dr Vella’s team at The Florey study the role of EVs in the progression of neurodegenerative diseases.
“At The Florey, we are developing ways to characterise EVs, understand their contents, and apply that understanding towards potential diagnostic and treatment strategies for diseases like dementia.”
“Because these ‘bubbles’ are naturally good at delivering information between cells, we’re also exploring how to use them as delivery vehicles for treatments,” Dr Vella said.
“Working together with my Florey colleague and fellow dementia researcher, Dr Rebecca Nisbet, we are discovering which types of EVs are best equipped to deliver drugs effectively into the brain.”
While EVs are a relatively new field of research, their contribution to dementia research is vital. Although current knowledge about dementia centres on changes in the brain in the later stages of Alzheimer’s disease, Dr Vella’s work aims to uncover the cellular and molecular changes earlier in the disease.
When someone is at the later stages, we know what impairments there are in the brain. But very little is known about the cellular changes that happen, say, 20 years prior to an individual’s symptoms.
Those insights are normally gathered from a post-mortem brain biopsy, but Dr Vella thinks EVs may provide a way to see changes in the brain through a person’s bloodstream.
“If we can gain a readout through the blood, it would help us better understand the early mechanisms in Alzheimer’s disease and potentially identify new drug targets.”
The need for answers in dementia research
Dr Vella says advancing this science is no easy feat.
“Dementia touches nearly every family, and people therefore assume that there must be massive funding and support behind efforts to solve it. But people are shocked when I tell them the truth: That we have to fight for research funding.”
Many talented and well-trained scientists are forced to leave the field. “When we lose people, we lose ideas and breakthroughs,” Dr Vella says.
Those losses are costly, especially for families and individuals affected by this devastating disease, as Dr Vella knows all too well. Both of her grandmothers are currently living in the same aged care facility in Melbourne, both having been diagnosed with dementia.
“My grandfather also had dementia, and he passed away many years ago. But what type of dementia did he have? What types do my grandmothers have? To this day, we don’t know.”
This lack of information affects patients and families, leaving them with no clarity on disease progression.
For Dr Vella, the heartbreaking realisation of the disease’s impact came on her birthday.
“My maternal grandmother, my Nanny Joan, always calls me first thing in the morning on my birthday – around 6:00 or 7:00 am,” Dr Vella says.
“But for the first time this year, the phone didn’t ring.”
Though the early signs were there years ago, marked by changes to her grandmothers’ memory and behaviour, the disease still couldn’t be stopped.
We knew the path she was heading down. And yet, even with that knowledge, there was nothing we could do to change the course of the disease. No treatment. No way to stop what was coming.
The frustration of losing a family member to dementia fuels Dr Vella’s search for better answers.
“The brain is still the great unknown,” Dr Vella says.
Although there has been little known for decades, the reality is finally changing, and Dr Vella and her team are determined to be part of the change.
