The human brain is like a very complex computer, possibly the most sophisticated biological structure in the known universe. It needs a lot of energy and oxygen to work. How does it get this? Can it store energy? Where does the waste go and how does it get out? Can there really be 650 km of blood vessels inside every brain?

In this Christmas lecture, Prof Joanna Wardlaw will speak about some of the clever ways that the blood vessel and brain cells work together to deliver the right amounts of energy and remove waste products. Do the brain blood vessels do more than that to help the brain? And why it is that when diseases of the brain blood vessels are amongst the commonest and most devastating in the whole world, do we still know so little about what goes wrong with them and how to make it better? Prof Wardlaw will explain some of the ways in which researchers are trying to make brain blood vessel diseases less troublesome.

Prof Joanna Wardlaw, CBE, FMedSci, FRSE, is Professor of Applied Neuroimaging and Consultant Neuroradiologist at the University of Edinburgh and NHS Lothian. She is a Principal Researcher in the new UK Dementia Research Institute at the University of Edinburgh. She has worked for many years to understand the brain and its blood supply, and on treatments to improve blood flow to the brain, such as the clotbusting drugs now used routinely to treat acute stroke.

Free registration is via Eventbrite through the website linked below.