Dr. Richard Mayeux Elected Fellow of AAAS

New York, NY (December 5, 2012) – Richard Mayeux, MD, MS, Chair of the Department of Neurology at Columbia University Medical Center; the Gertrude H. Sergievsky Professor of Neurology, Psychiatry and Epidemiology; and Director of the Sergievsky Center, has been awarded the distinction of Fellow by the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS).

Dr. Mayeux, who is also Co-Director of the Taub Institute for Research on Alzheimer’s Disease and the Aging Brain, was cited “for pioneering contributions to the epidemiology of Alzheimer’s disease based on studies of multi-racial populations, utilization of biological and genetic markers, and defining the complex interactions of both environmental and genetic factors in rates of dementia.”

“We are delighted that Dr. Mayeux is among this year’s class of AAAS fellows,” said Lee Goldman, MD, Executive Vice President for Health and Biomedical Sciences, Columbia University, and Dean of the Faculties of Health Sciences and Medicine, CUMC. “His epidemiological research on Alzheimer’s disease, including work on various genetic risk factors among different populations, helps bring us closer to understanding this devastating disease.”

Fellows—selected by the greater AAAS membership from among its own ranks—are awarded this special honor because of their efforts to advance scientific applications that are deemed especially promising or socially distinguished. Their names were formally announced by the AAAS in the “News & Notes” section of the journal Science on November 30, 2012. The awards ceremony is scheduled to take place at the 2013 AAAS annual meeting in Boston on February 16.

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 Columbia University Medical Center provides international leadership in basic, pre-clinical and clinical research; in medical and health sciences education; and in patient care. The medical center trains future leaders and includes the dedicated work of many physicians, scientists, public health professionals, dentists, and nurses at the College of Physicians and Surgeons, the Mailman School of Public Health, the College of Dental Medicine, the School of Nursing, the biomedical departments of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, and allied research centers and institutions. Established in 1767, Columbia’s College of Physicians & Surgeons was the first institution in the country to grant the M.D. degree and is now among the most selective medical schools in the country. Columbia University Medical Center is home to the largest medical research enterprise in New York City and state and one of the largest in the United States. For more information, please visit www.cumc.columbia.edu.

The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) is the world’s largest general scientific society, and publisher of the journal, Science (www.sciencemag.org). AAAS was founded in 1848, and includes some 262 affiliated societies and academies of science, serving 10 million individuals. Science has the largest paid circulation of any peer-reviewed general science journal in the world, with an estimated total readership of 1 million. The non-profit AAAS (www.aaas.org) is open to all and fulfills its mission to “advance science and serve society” through initiatives in science policy; international programs; science education; and more. For the latest research news, log onto EurekAlert!, www.eurekalert.org, the premier science-news Web site, a service of AAAS.

Media Contact: cumcnews@columbia.edu, 212-305-3900

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AAAS, ALZHEIMER, American Association for the Advancement of Science, Boston, Columbia Mailman School of Public Health, Columbia University, Columbia University Medical Center, New York City, United States