At last month’s annual dinner, the Alliance gave eminent Harvard researcher Rudolph E. Tanzi. Ph.D., the Silver Innovator Award for spearheading his research lab’s “Alzheimer’s-in-a-dish model,” a revolutionary 3-D discovery that gives new hope for the development of therapies to treat and cure the condition.
At the dinner, Dr. Tanzi gave insights into his Alzheimer’s disease research over the last couple of decades, including the genesis of Alzheimer’s-in-a-dish.
He spoke passionately about the tragic effect of the disease. “It robs you of who you are and robs your loved ones of who you are,” he said. “This is an urgent situation. This is a crisis. This is an epidemic.”
But he also expressed optimism about the prospects for stopping the disease and emphasized the importance of supporting Alzheimer’s research.
“I’m very optimistic. I firmly believe we are seeing the light at the end of the tunnel on Alzheimer’s now,” he said. “We need foundations, we need groups like the Alliance, to keep supporting NIH, to keep supporting research.”
