On Thursday September 25th, the CONTRAST2 young talents gathered in Utrecht for an educational afternoon program around the theme of “The post-PhD journey: building your career after PhD”, including two alumni talks and a workshop. Afterwards they enjoyed some well deserved pizza and drinks.
It was great to see so many of our hard-working PhD students coming together.

A recently published paper in JAMA Neurology from CONTRAST2 WP3C – IRIS. Congratulations to all authors!

Intracranial Hemorrhage in Patients With Stroke After Endovascular Treatment With or Without IV Alteplase: An Individual Participant Data Meta-Analysis.

Zhou Y, Zhang L, Cavalcante F, Suzuki K, Treurniet KM, Yan B, Mitchell P, Bush S, Fischer U, Kaesmacher J, Gralla J, Strbian D, Rohner R, Kappelhof M, Roos Y, Majoie C, Zi W, Yang Q, Zhang Y, Matsumaru Y, Kimura K, Ye X, Yang P, Liu J; IRIS collaborators.JAMA Neurol. 2025 Aug 11:e252610. doi: 10.1001/jamaneurol.2025.2610. Online ahead of print.PMID: 40788598

There are two upcoming PhD defences within the CONTRAST2 community. We congratulate these soon to be Doctors with this major achievement!

Vrijdag 19 september 2025 10:00 uur Agnietenkapel, Universiteit van Amsterdam
Promotie Drs. Leon Rinkel, Amsterdam UMC
Titel: Cardiac CT in acute ischemic stroke
Promotoren:
– Prof. dr. J.C. Coutinho
– Prof. dr. C.B. Majoie
Co-promotoren:
– Dr. R.N. Planken
– Prof. dr. Y.B. Roos

Woensdag 1 oktober 2025 14:00 uur Aula Universiteit van Amsterdam (Lutherse Kerk)
Promotie Drs. Lucas de Vries, Amsterdam UMC
Titel: Revisiting CT perfusion for acute ischemic stroke with deep learning
Promotoren:
– Dr. E. Gavves
– Prof. dr. H.A. Marquering
Co-promotoren:
– Dr. B.J. Emmer
– Prof. dr. C.B. Majoie

August 2025

In April, we opened the second round of the CONTRAST2 Young Talent Travel Grants, which gives young CONTRAST researchers the opportunity to go abroad for two months to establish a collaboration.

We congratulate the following people:

• Govert van der Gun – Erasmus MC – WP8
  Using Real-World Data and Advanced Causal Inference Methods to Address Open Questions in Stroke: Beyond the RCTObservational Study Dichotomy – at Harvard School of Public Health, Boston Massachusetts
• Sterre Dassen – Maastricht UMC – WP3a 
  Impact of baseline imaging parameters on treatment effect in EVT for medium vessel occlusion stroke – at the University Hospital Basel, Switzerland
• Xi Li – Erasmus MC – WP9 
  Prediction Modelling to Optimize the Use of Endovascular Treatment after 6-24 hours of Acute Ischemic Stroke – at Stanford University Medical Centre, California 
• Yasmin Sadigh – Erasmus MC
  The Anatomical Distribution and Variations of Deep Cerebral Perforating Arteries Post-Vascupaint Perfusion in Human Cadavers – at the University of Valencia, Spain 

We look forward to seeing the results of their projects!

Next year in April, we will open another call for these Young Talent Travel Grants and encourage all young researchers with an idea for a project to submit their proposal.

Last week Monday, April 7th, was the annual CONTRAST2 meeting in Amsterdam, location AMC.

It was really nice to see so many people affiliated with CONTRAST2 work get together, share their knowledge and experience, and engage in conversations.

From what has been shared, it is clear that many activities and studies in CONTRAST2 are ongoing and progressing really well. Inclusion rates in the different ongoing studies are impressive, and in the following years, we really expect to show CONTRAST2 generated (preliminary)data. We continue to grow our community, fostering collaborations between parties that normally might not interact as much, and developing a strong network spanning even beyond all directly involved parties.  

The day before the annual meeting, on Sunday April 6th, also the annual young talent meeting took place. During this meeting, we strengthen the interaction between the PhDs involved in CONTRAST2, bridging different Work Packages as well as different institutes. Connecting the PhDs, which often includes the trial coordinators from the different studies, is essential to ensure interaction between the different studies, and to make sure that we can learn from each others successes and difficulties.  

We will continue to share our achievements and results, so please stay in touch via our serval news letters, website or LinkedIn.

This months, in Lancet Neurology, a paper is published assessing whether the presence of carotid tandem lesions would modify the safety and efficacy of intravenous thrombolysis in patients who could directly undergo endovascular treatment.
We want to congratulate all authors with this publication!

Fabiano Cavalcante, Kilian Treurniet, Johannes Kaesmacher, Manon Kappelhof, …, Yvo B W E M Roos, Zhong Rong Miao, Zifu Li, Intravenous thrombolysis before endovascular treatment versus endovascular treatment alone for patients with large vessel occlusion and carotid tandem lesions: individual participant data meta-analysis of six randomised trials, The Lancet Neurology,
Volume 24, Issue 4, 2025,Pages 305-315, ISSN 1474-4422, https://doi.org/10.1016/S1474-4422(25)00045-6.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1474442225000456?dgcid=coauthor

We are very pleased to announce that the CONTRAST2 call for young talent research travel grants is now open. This call is for PhD students and postdocs working in the acute stroke research field and are affiliated with CONTRAST. This grant, with a maximum budget of €10.000, can fund a visit to a renowned research group in- or outside Europe for a two-month period, during which the applicant can set up a collaboration and data sharing project to complement their research project.

The application deadline is May 15^th, 2025. This call is the second in a series of yearly calls to stimulate young investigators to expand their horizon and become acquainted with international collaboration in research.

For more information and for proposal submission, please visit this page: