Lluis Samaranch, PhD
Dr. Samaranch received his B.Sc. degree and PhD from the University of Navarra (Pamplona, Spain), studying biomarkers for early detection of Alzheimer-type dementia. During this time, he mastered many techniques in the fields of genetics, biochemistry, neuroimaging, and psychology.
Dr. Samaranch performed his first post-doctoral training at the Applied Research Medical Center (Pamplona, Spain) where he worked on the genetic characterization of familial Parkinson’s disease through mapping new candidate genes and dissecting genetic risk factors of different genes involved as LRRK2, Parkin and PINK1. He continued his post-doctoral training at the UCSF Translational Neuroscience Research Laboratory, where he study the transport and expression levels of different serotypes of adeno-associated vectors carrying therapeutic transgenes after their delivery into the central nervous system.
Currently, Dr. Samaranch is working on evaluation of brain and spinal cord distribution, axonal transport and cellular specificity of different serotypes of adeno-associated viral vectors after being injected in the central nervous system. His research focuses on brain parenchymal injections and cerebrospinal fluid delivery of therapeutic agents. Dr. Samaranch interests also include: i) the characterization of new capsid-engineered vectors as better tools for AAV-based gene therapy; ii) the deep understanding of the immunological consequences after adeno-associated viral vectors delivery into the central nervous system; and iii) the development of a therapeutic platform based on the CSF delivery of adeno-associated viral vectors for rare genetically inherited brain disease.