Vanderbilt student wins award to study how seizures steal consciousness

Anas Reda has received a new doctoral research award to investigate why some seizures erase a person's awareness.

The Canadian Institutes of Health Research Doctoral Research Award supports Reda's work in the Brain Imaging and Electrophysiology Network Lab at Vanderbilt. His research focuses on how seizures disrupt the brain networks that control consciousness, breathing, and autonomic function in patients with temporal lobe epilepsy.

Reda said his primary goal is to identify what distinguishes preserved awareness from its loss during a seizure. He aims to understand how the brain loses and regains consciousness so researchers can eventually prevent that loss. A second major goal of the award involves predicting Sudden Unexpected Death in Epilepsy, a condition that stems from the same network disruptions.

Associate Professor Dario Englot leads the lab where Reda conducts this research. Englot stated that Reda's work is instrumental for helping epilepsy patients and for understanding fundamental brain mechanisms. He noted that the work provides insight into the mechanisms of consciousness and cognition.

The lab recently secured a $3.3 million National Institutes of Health R01 grant. That funding will support research into loss of consciousness and long-term cognitive decline. The project aims to build neuromodulation devices, including next-generation VNS and DBS systems, to prevent consciousness loss, stop seizures, and improve patient cognition.

Reda, who is from Casablanca, Morocco, chose Vanderbilt for its specific clinical resources. He highlighted the university's high volume of deep brain stimulation procedures and the Epilepsy Monitoring Unit, which has 12 dedicated beds. Reda said the unit sees several SEEG cases a month, providing direct access to human intracranial data. He noted that the lab is a five-minute walk from the EMU, allowing for seamless integration of clinical data collection and computational analysis.

Reda has received multiple honors for his work in the past two years. This year, he won the Grass Foundation Young Investigator Award, which recognizes eight outstanding young researchers in epilepsy neuroscience. Last year, he received a Young Investigator Award given to 20 such researchers. He also holds the Provost Pathbreaking Discovery Award from Vanderbilt, an Emerging Excellence in Epilepsy Mortality Research recognition from Partners Against Mortality in Epilepsy, and the Lacy-Fischer Interdisciplinary Research Grant.