Date: Tuesday 28th October 2025
Time: 12.30 – 1.30
Speaker: Dr Daniel Erskine, Senior Lecturer in Neurodegenerative Pathology and Faculty Theme Lead for Mental Health, Dementia and Neurodegeneration at Newcastle University
Daniel leads a research programme dedicated to understanding Lewy body diseases and related neurometabolic conditions, particularly lysosomal storage disorders and mitochondrial diseases. This work has been recognised by the awarding of two Alzheimer’s Research UK Fellowships (2019 and 2022) and the Rising Star in Lewy Body Dementia Research Gold Award in 2022
Title: Neuropathology-driven drug discovery in metachromatic leukodystrophy
Abstract: Metachromatic leukodystrophy (MLD) is a rare lysosomal storage disorder resulting from bi-allelic loss-of-function variants in ARSA, a gene encoding a lysosomal enzyme that hydrolyses sulphatides, leading to elevated levels of its substrate sulphatide and striking leukodystrophy. Although gene therapy is available for MLD, many patients do not benefit from this and, thus, we have set out to identify novel therapeutic targets in MLD. In this presentation, I will outline our data to date that integrates proteomics analysis of post-mortem MLD brain tissue, modelling of potentially pathologically relevant pathways in both patient-derived fibroblasts and modified cell lines, in addition to computational modelling of lipid-protein interactions that may mediate cellular dysfunction and death.