Small vessel disease brain bank resource

Cerebral small vessel disease (CSVD) is a major contributor to neurodegenerative disease, stroke and dementia, common neurological disorders and major areas of strategic importance to international biomedical research. This brain bank facility supports biomedical research both nationally and internationally. The MRC-funded Edinburgh Brain Bank allows us to study CSVD evolution in subclinical states using 331 sudden death controls across a wide age range and donations from the Lothian Birth cohort (LBC) 1936. We can also study CSVD in symptomatic disease states, using cases with dementia from the Alzheimer Scotland Dementia Research Centre (ASDRC), and cases from the Lothian INtraCerebral Haemorrhage Pathology, Imaging and Neurological outcome (LINCHPIN) study 2010-2016, previously funded by MRC and The Stroke Association. We are retrieving tissues from a complementary clinical cohort with subcortical (lacunar) ischaemic stroke; these individuals range in age from 40 to mid-90s and, and survivors have been followed-up clinically and with advanced MRI methods. To maximise the value of donated tissues from these cohorts we apply consistent data linkage across all cohorts, resulting in a unique brain bank resource covering all aspects of CSVD morbidity. For the tissue within the brain bank we link in vivo brain imaging, primary care and secondary care data to provide a detailed lifecourse dataset to richly annotate the retrieved tissues. The brain bank is a bioresource with detailed liefetime linked data and is aligned with priorities on cognitive decline, dementia and intracerebral haemorrhage, and is a unique resource addressing these priority areas. The facility is integrated within the Edinburgh Brain Bank, a diverse brain bank facility, which has been funded continuously by MRC for 12 years.