Common features of the aging brain are ‘mixed cerebral pathologies’, including cerebral small vessel disease (CSVD), amyloid β (Aβ) deposits and neurodegeneration. New strategies for prevention and therapy require an improved understanding of the interplay between these and other factors such as lifestyle and cognitive reserve. To this end, we perform (i) multimodal imaging and lifestyle studies on human CSVD cohorts comprising patients suffering from cerebral amyloid angiopathy (CAA) and (ii) intravital imaging studies on spontaneously hypertensive stroke-prone rats (SHRSP). Our methodological spectrum comprises MRI, PET, sonography, intravital microscopy (2PM) and intracerebral stereotactic injections, as well as conventional histology, immunohistochemistry, western blot techniques, zymography, and transmission electron microscopy
