دکتر زهرا موسوی

Innovative approaches in early diagnosis, treatment and monitoring of Alzheimer disease

 Dr. Zahra Moussavi

Canada Research Chair in Biomedical Engineering at the University of Manitoba

Adjunct scientist at the Telecommunication Research Lab (TRLabs, Manitoba) and Dept. of Elec. & Comp. Eng., University of Texas at El Paso

Abstract

For most degenerative brain diseases, such as dementia and in particular Alzheimer disease (AD), there is no known cure. There is already irreversible brain damage by the time an elderly individual is diagnosed with AD using current techniques. Presently the only definitive diagnosis of AD is an autopsy. While there are hopes to slow the disease progress if detected at very early stages, early diagnosis is difficult since many AD victims have similar symptoms and brain scans that resemble those of a normal aging brain. In addition, due to overlapping symptoms, separating AD from other types of dementias such as Lewy Body, vascular and Parkinsonian dementias (LBD, VaD and PDD) or even mild cognitive impairment (MCI; a transitory state between normal and AD) is almost impossible with current objective tests unless the disease is quite advanced. Lack of any gold standard in early AD diagnosis, difficulty in separation of AD from different types of dementias at early stages, and lack of scientific evidence for the effectiveness of any AD treatment make this field of study very challenging. This talk discusses an innovative approach, psychophysical experiment for objective measurement of brain’s spatiotemporal processing, for solving these challenging problems.

Short Bio

Dr. Zahra Moussavi received her B.Sc. from Sharif University of Technology, Iran, M.Sc. from the University of Calgary, and Ph.D. from University of Manitoba, Canada, all in Electrical Engineering, and postdoctoral fellowship in Biomedical Engineering from Johns Hopkins University.  She joined the University of Manitoba, Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering as a faculty member in 1999, where she is currently a professor. As of May 2009, she has also been appointed as the Canada Research Chair in Biomedical Engineering at the University of Manitoba. She is also an adjunct scientist at the Telecommunication Research Lab (TRLabs, Manitoba) and Dept. of Elec. & Comp. Eng., University of Texas at El Paso. With over 100 publications in prestigious journals and conferences, her current research includes acoustic sleep apnea detection, respiratory and swallowing sound analysis, early diagnosis of Alzheimer disease, and rehabilitation.