  |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
 |
||
|
|
Many AFAR grantees are gaining attention for their research in high-profile media, helping AFAR better communicate to the public the importance of supporting such research. For more information, please contact Stacey Harris, Director of Communications at AFAR at 212.703.9977 or via email at stacey@afar.org. 2000 Beeson Scholar Catherine Sarkisian, MD, of the University of California at Los Angeles, was cited in Reuters Health December 5, 2007, in an article about older adults who had experienced lower expectations about aging. Those who expected to experience more health-related decline as they grew older, were more likely to report spending less time engaging in physical activity than those with higher age expectations. These observations were from her study of 636 adults aged 65 and older. Her research was originally published in the October, 2005, issue of the Journal of General Internal Medicine. Thomas Perls, MD, MPH, 1998 Beeson Scholar, of Boston University, and David Sinclair, PhD, 2000 AFAR Research Grant recipient, of Harvard University, both discussed their recent work in longevity and healthy aging on the November 11, 2007, broadcast of CBS News Sunday Morning. Perls is currently investigating the effects of lifestyle choices on the longevity of centenarians. Sinclair is working to develop a pill that will mimic the health enhancing effects of caloric restriction in the human body. The research of 2000 Pfizer/AFAR Research Grant recipient and University California Irvine researcher Frank LaFerla, PhD, about the restorative effects of stem cells to reduce memory problems, was covered in New Scientist and Scientific American.com in November, 2007. Laura E. Niklason, MD, PhD, of Yale University and a recipient of the 2001 AFAR Research Grant and the 2002 Paul Beeson Career Development Award in Aging Research recipient, was profiled in the Charlotte News & Observer in November, 2007. The article profiled her research on replicating blood vessels that can be used for dialysis patients and in heart bypass surgery.On October 31, 2007, Gordon Lithgow, PhD, of the Buck Institute and 2006 Glenn/AFAR Breakthroughs in Gerontology (BIG) Award recipient, Gawain McColl, PhD, formerly of the Buck Institute and now at the Mental Health Research Institute of Victoria, Australia, and 2003 Glenn/AFAR Postdoctoral Fellow, and David Killilea, PhD, of Children's Hospital Oakland Research Institute and 2003 Glenn/AFAR Postdoctoral Fellow, were featured in Science Daily. The article discussed the researchers' work regarding the use of lithium, a drug to treat mood affective disorders, in increasing lifespan in nematode worms. In an article in the Los Angeles Times on October 8, 2007, 2000 Pfizer/AFAR Research Grant recipient, James Lah, MD, PhD, of Emory University, discusses potential genetic markers for diagnosing Alzheimer's disease.In an October 7, 2007, article in The New York Times, 2000 Beeson Scholar, Jason Karlawish, MD, from the University of Pennsylvania, points out that a diagnosis for a mental disease does not mean the person is incapable of working, making decisions, or voting. Anne Louise Oaklander, MD, PhD, of the Massachusetts General Hospital and 1999 Beeson Scholar, was featured on CNN.com on September 24, 2007. The feature focused on treating patients with chronic pain that do not have an obvious cause of the pain and do not respond to medicine. Research published in the journal Cell by David Sinclair, PhD, of Harvard Medical School and 2000 AFAR Research Grant recipient, was featured on MSNBC.com on September 20, 2007. Dr. Sinclair's research shows that certain genes, SIRT3 and SIRT4, can help keep our cells healthy and youthful and suggest that one day a pill may replicate the beneficial effects of caloric restriction in extending healthy life. Elizabeth Phelan, MD, of Harborview Medical Center and 2003 Beeson Scholar, was featured in the Seattle Times on September 10, 2007, offering recommendations on preventing falls in the elderly. An August 19, 2007 article in The New York Times sports magazine, PLAY, cited Scott Small, MD, of Columbia University and 2000 Beeson Scholar, whose study shows that exercise has a positive effect on cognitive function. Increased exercise resulted in increased blood flow to the brain, which was associated with improvements in memory. Research by 1999 Beeson Scholar Thomas Rando, MD, PhD, of Stanford University School of Medicine, indicates that a stem cell's ability to reproduce, regardless of the age of the stem cell, is dependent on the age of the cell's environment. The study was published in the August 2007, issue of Science and featured in articles on Forbes.com, Voice of America, and Science Daily. Malaz Boustani, MD, MPH, of Indiana University School of Medicine and 2005 Beeson Scholar, was featured in WebMD, Medical News Today, the Los Angeles Times, and other media outlets for his recent study published in the Journal of the American Geriatric Society, in August, 2007. Dr. Boustani's study looked into the long-term effect of H2 blocker use, as a contributing factor in the development of cognitive impairment. The study showed that there was a 2.4 higher chance of developing some type of cognitive impairment if a H2 blocker had been used for more than two years. Wes Ely, MD, of Vanderbilt University School of Medicine and 2001 Beeson Scholar, was featured in U.S. News & World Report on July 18, 2007. The article focused on Dr. Ely's research on delirium in older hospitalized patients. Methods for detecting delirium in patients and helping to prevent delirium were presented. A July 3, 2007, Washington Post article on palliative care cited 2000 Beeson Scholar Sean Morrison, MD, from the Mount Sinai School of Medicine, on how the use of palliative care not only provides very ill patients with the care they need but also lowers hospital costs at the same time. On July 2, 2007, 2000 Beeson Scholar Jason Karlawish, MD, from the University of Pennsylvania, was cited in a Pittsburgh Tribune Review article advocating the improvement of voting capabilities for nursing home residents. Dellara Terry, MD, MPH, of the Boston University School of Medicine and a 2005 Beeson Scholar, was cited in the August, 2007, issue of Real Simple magazine, offering tips on living healthier longer. Bernadette McGuinness, MD, MRCP, Research Fellow/Specialist Registrar, Queen's University of Belfast, first recipient of the Paul B. Beeson Career Development Award extension to the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland, was featured in the June 25, 2007 issue of the Belfast Telegraph. Her research focuses on the neuropsychological changes and genetics of early Alzheimer's disease. On June 10, 2007, 1997 Beeson Scholar Todd Golde, MD, PhD, from the Mayo Clinic and 1987 AFAR Research Grant recipient David Morgan, PhD, from the University of South Florida, were cited in a New York Times article about drug development for Alzheimer's disease. Research about enrollment of Alzheimer's disease patients in clinical trials conducted by 2000 Beeson Scholar Jason Karlawish, MD, of the University of Pennsylvania was featured in the The Washington Post, Forbes.com and several other media outlets in June 2007. Dr. Karlawish's study questioned whether home visits made by researchers would help increase the number of caregivers who are willing to enroll Alzheimer's disease patients in clinical trials. The study found that not only were more caregivers inclined to enroll their loved ones, but also that home visits could result in shorter recruitment periods and increase patient retention. 2000 Beeson Scholar Cynthia Carlsson, MD, of the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health was cited in a June 1, 2007 HealthDay article about folic acid supplementation and strokes. The story was picked up by Forbes.com A March 26, 2007, Newsweek cover story about exercise and the brain featured two AFAR-supported scientists: Scott Small, MD, of Columbia University and Kristine Yaffe, MD, of the University of California, San Francisco, both recipients of the Paul Beeson Career Development Award in Aging Research, a partnership program supported by AFAR. Dr. Small discussed the results of his research showing that humans who exercised regularly during a three-month period grew new brain cells in the areas of the brain that controlled learning and memory. Dr. Yaffe commented about the additional cognitive benefits of exercise. Anne Cappola, MD, of the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine and Mark Lachs, MD, of The New York Presbyterian Health System/Weill Cornell appeared on the WABC-TV program Viewpoints on March 18, 2007, to discuss how men and women age. Dr. Cappola's research focuses on hormonal alterations that occur with aging and the clinical impact these changes have in older women, particularly with regard to rates of aging and frailty. Her innovative research may lead to a design of a new form of hormone replacement therapy that will help slow the development of sarcopenia, a condition that develops with age. Dr. Cappola is a 2001 recipient of the AFAR/Pfizer Research Grant in Hormones and Aging. Dr. Lachs, Director of Geriatrics at The New York Presbyterian Health System and Irene F. and I. Roy Psaty Distinguished Professor of Medicine and Co-chief of the division of Geriatric Medicine and Gerontology at the Weill Medical College of Cornell University, is a preeminent geriatrician and authority on the issue of elder abuse. He is a recipient of the Beeson award and a current AFAR board member. Research conducted by Scott Pletcher, PhD, at Baylor College of Medicine and the first recipient of the Glenn/AFAR Breakthroughs in Gerontology Award (BIG) showed that the life-lengthening effects of caloric restriction were negated by the odor of yeast paste in fruit flies. The study, reported in the journal Science in February, 2007, found that the flies that could smell rich food in the environment lived shorter lives than flies that ate the same amount of food but were not exposed to the odorant. Dr. Pletcher’s research was featured in The Scientist, Scientific American, Nature and Slate. NOVA scienceNOW, the acclaimed science series on PBS, featured a 13-minute broadcast segment on aging and longevity genes. The segment, which aired January 9, 2007, included interviews with Nir Barzilai, MD, of the Albert Einstein College of Medicine (1994 AFAR Research Grant recipient and 1997 Beeson Scholar) and David Sinclair, PhD, of Harvard University (2000 AFAR Research Grant recipient). To watch the segment or view additional materials, visit the NOVA scienceNOW web site.
Findings by David Sinclair, PhD, about the beneficial role of the enzyme resveratrol on health and lifespan, generated worldwide media attention in the fall of 2006. In a paper published in the November 2 issue of Nature, Dr. Sinclair and colleagues at Harvard Medical School found that high doses of resveratrol, a substance found in red wine, can prevent early deaths in mice fed a diet so high in calories that they became obese. The study provides encouragement to scientists who are trying to develop drugs to prevent diseases like heart disease and diabetes that are associated with obesity in people. Several other AFAR Research Grant recipients were featured in related coverage, including Matt Kaeberlein, PhD, of the University of Washington (2006 recipient), Brian Kennedy, PhD, also of the University of Washington (2003 recipient), and Nir Barzilai, MD, who were featured in the New York Times and The Wall Street Journal in November 2006. Research by 2003 Beeson Scholar Norman Sharpless, MD, featured in The New York Times, Scientific American and several other media outlets nationwide, found that the removal of a cancer-fighting gene slows the process of aging. In an effort to prevent cancer, this gene stops our stem cells' ability to duplicate as we age. Dr. Sharpless found that in animals that lacked this gene, stem cells continued to divide and renew, preventing the tissue deterioration that occurs with normal aging. An interview with Dr. Sharpless can be found on AFAR’s consumer web site Infoaging Five AFAR-supported researchers, including Dellara Terry, MD, a 2005 Beeson Scholar at Boston University, Thomas Johnson, PhD, a 1986 & 1987 AFAR Grantee at the University of Colorado, and Daniel Promislow, PhD, a 1996 AFAR Grantee at the University of Georgia, were featured in the September/October 2006 special healthy aging issue of AARP: The Magazine. The article highlights advances in biomedical aging research over the last two decades and the various behavioral and genetic theories scientists have about how and why we age. You can find the article online here. Earlier this year, Dr. David Sinclair co-authored the cover story for the March 2006 issue of Scientific American, outlining several genes that may hold the key not only to extending lifespan, but also treating and preventing the major diseases of aging such as diabetes, cancer and Alzheimer's. In his coverage of the future of longevity genes, Dr. Sinclair refers to the work of Pere Puigserver, PhD, a 2004 AFAR Research Grant recipient at Johns Hopkins University. Dr. Puigserver's research has revealed that the molecule responsible for enhancing the health and longevity brought by caloric restriction in mammals may also activate a protein that helps maintain constant blood glucose levels, which the brain uses as fuel during caloric restriction. Because this molecule affects blood sugar levels, Dr. Puigserver's finding could also help advance research into diabetes. Mary Whooley, MD, a 2001 Beeson Scholar and 1998 AFAR Research Grant recipient, was featured in several television, internet and print news sources for her comprehensive review of studies linking depression and heart disease. Dr. Whooley, an assistant professor of medicine at the University of California, San Francisco and internist at the San Francisco Veterans Affairs Medical Center, found that depression is far more prevalent in heart patients than in the general population, affecting one out of five coronary heart disease patients and one out of three with heart failure— versus one in twenty of the general population. Depression is often associated with mental health risks, but Dr. Whooley advises fellow doctors to consider depression a physical health risk as well, due to the related elevated stress hormones and/or behavioral consequences that could affect the heart.Beeson Scholar Anne Louise Oaklander, MD, PhD, was interviewed for a May 30, 2006 article in the New York Times. Dr. Oaklander, a leading pain expert, recently discovered that complex regional pain syndrome (CRPS-I), a mysterious pain syndrome that affects approximately one million Americans, is due to physical abnormality in the nerves and is not psychosomatic, as previously thought. Dr. Oaklander is the director of the nerve injury unit at Massachusetts General Hospital and an associate professor of neurology and assistant professor of anesthesia at Harvard University. Drs. Nir Barzilai, Tom Johnson and Richard Miller were featured in The Scientist's March 2006 issue on the future of aging research and its impact on an aging society. Dr. Barzilai, a Beeson Scholar and AFAR Research Grant recipient, commented on a diabetes drug that may affect aging and age-related diseases, while Drs. Miller and Johnson— also AFAR Research Grant recipients— weighed in on the future of biomarkers in aging. Dr. Miller also wrote the cover article about the impact of aging research on disease, public health and the future. Two-time AFAR grant recipient Adam Gazzaley, MD, PhD, was featured in The Wall Street Journal's March 3, 2006 Science Journal on the aging brain. A recent study by Dr. Gazzaley, recipient of a 2005 Pfizer Innovations in Aging Research Grant and a 2002 Glenn/AFAR Research Grant for Post-doctoral Fellows, suggests that older adults do not filter out irrelevant information as well as their younger counterparts and this extraneous information affects their short-term memory and reasoning. However, Dr. Gazzaley's study also suggests that memory impairment may not be inevitable as we age— one-third of the older adults did as well as the younger group in the memory tasks. Throughout the month of March 2006, Frank LaFerla, PhD, was featured in several online media— including SciAm.com, Forbes.com and BBC Online— for his recent breakthrough in a possible treatment for Alzheimer's disease. Dr. LaFerla, recipient of a 2000 Pfizer/AFAR Research Grant in Age-Related Neurodegenerative Diseases, found that a drug may block the progression of Alzheimer's by preventing the buildup of protein plaques and tangles in areas of the brain that are predominantly affected by Alzheimer's. This is the first time an experimental drug was shown to affect both plaques and tangles associated with Alzheimer's. The drug also appears to reverse Alzheimer's-related cognitive decline, allowing test subjects to perform remarkably better on tests of memory and learning. AFAR Press Releases (also see Events)
AFAR and GE Healthcare Support Early Career Scientists Studying Biomarkers of Aging Ellison Medical Foundation and AFAR team up for two awards in 2008 AFAR Hosts Conference on Biomarkers of Aging AFAR Sustains the Momentum at Awards Dinner Rosalinde and Arthur Gilbert Foundation/AFAR Award Alzheimer's Disease Grants New Program Advances Scientific Collaborations in Aging Research AFAR to Host Scientific Conference on Biomarkers of Aging Imaging and Aging Brain E-Briefing Top Neuroscientists Gather at Imaging Conference on the Aging Brain Media Advisory -- AFAR to Host Conference on Imaging and the Aging Brain AFAR Mourns the Death of Vincent Cristofalo American Federation for Aging Research Awards Grants to Scientists Studying Biology of Aging American Federation for Aging Research Elects New President AFAR Celebrates 25 Years of Advancing Great Minds in ScienceNobel Laureate Joshua Lederberg Among the Honorees AFAR’s 25th Anniversary Milestones Advances in Aging Research Timeline GE Healthcare Supports Early-Career Scientists Studying the Aging Brain Study: Scientists Focusing Less on Longevity, More on How We Age and Why We Die AFAR Kicks Off Health Luncheon Series Researchers Selected for the First Breakthroughs in Gerontology (BIG) Award 11 Scientists Named Beeson Scholars, Receive $8 Million to Conduct Research on Aging Oracle CEO Larry Ellison and Pfizer Honored for Contributions to Aging Research AFAR Hosts Media Briefing About "Anti-Aging" Medicine Einstein Researchers Identify Gene Connected to Human Aging and Exceptional Longevity AFAR and Pfizer to Provide $200,000 Grants to Promising Junior Scientists Highlights from AFAR Media Briefing: Staying on Top of Your Game Announcement of the 2003 Beeson Scholars AFAR launches Rochester, New York office The American Federation for Aging Research (AFAR) hosts a media briefing with NASA Another Space Milestone for John Glenn Vaccines Critical For Senior's Health Announcement of the 2000 Beeson Scholars
|
|
||||||||
American Federation for Aging Research (AFAR) | 55 West 39th Street, 16th Floor | New York, NY 10018 Phone: (212) 703-9977 | Toll-free: (888) 582-2327 | Fax: (212) 997-0330 E-mail: grants@afar.org or info@afar.org |
||||||||||
