Innovative approach to treat Frontotemporal Dementia by eliminating pathological proteins

Giuseppe Battaglia.

Fundació Institut de Bioenginyeria de Catalunya, Spain.

Frontotemporal dementia is a neurodegenerative disease linked to an abnormal build-up of proteins in the brain. Existing treatments address symptoms but do not remove the aggregates. This project aims to test whether restoring the brain’s natural protein-clearance function can help modify disease progression.

dePROTEIN is a nanotherapy platform designed to clear pathological brain protein aggregates by restoring clearance at the blood-brain barrier. Following validation in Alzheimer's disease, this project will extend the approach to frontotemporal dementia. The goal is to evaluate whether restoring the brain’s clearance mechanism could provide an effective therapeutic strategy for neurodegeneration more broadly.

The project could establish a first-in-class treatment paradigm that targets an underlying disease mechanism rather than symptoms alone. This approach could help preserve patients’ functional independence for longer, delaying institutional care and reducing the burden on families and carers. The platform could also be extended to other neurodegenerative diseases, including Parkinson’s disease and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis.

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