The hunt for better therapies

UF Health researchers and their colleagues will receive up to $7.7 million in funding over five years from the National Institutes of Health to use large data sets in humans and animals to speed up the process of finding therapies for Alzheimer’s disease. The grant is part of a $45 million NIH initiative from the Office of the NIH Director with additional funding from the National Institute on Aging, the lead institute within NIH for Alzheimer’s research. “There is a huge unmet need with Alzheimer’s disease,” said Todd Golde, M.D., Ph.D., director of the UF Center for Translational Research in Neurodegenerative Medicine. “The economic costs for Alzheimer’s disease are now higher than those of heart disease and cancer, and as there are no therapies that modify the course of the disease, this is a devastating disorder for both patients who suffer from it and their families. With this grant, we hope to accelerate the discovery of possible diseasemodifying therapies.” — Melissa Lutz Blouin