Richard Mayeux, Md, Msc, Honored With Henry Wisniewski Lifetime Achievement Award In Alzheimerï¾’S Disease Research

NEW YORK (July 13, 2009) ­– Richard Mayeux, MD, MSc, Gertrude H. Sergievsky Professor of Neurology, Psychiatry and Epidemiology, and co-director of the Taub Institute for Research on Alzheimer’s Disease and the Aging Brain at Columbia University Medical Center, was today awarded a Henry Wisniewski Lifetime Achievement Award in Alzheimer’s Disease Research at the 13th International Conference on Alzheimer’s Disease (ICAD) in Vienna.

The Alzheimer’s Association presents the prestigious award to outstanding scientists who have dedicated themselves to helping millions around the world through their research.

“I am honored to be chosen for this award and am especially grateful for the support of ICAD as a facilitator of the exchange of ideas among those of us dedicated to Alzheimer’s research. To be selected by my peers who are my partners in the fight against this devastating disease, which has touched the lives of so many, is extremely humbling,” says Dr. Mayeux.

Most noted for his research showing that Alzheimer’s disease likely results from a complex mixture of altered genes and exposure to environmental factors, Dr. Mayeux is director of an ongoing epidemiological investigation of Alzheimer’s disease and related conditions, known as the Washington Heights-Inwood Community Aging Project, currently in its 20th year.

Presently, Dr. Mayeux is leading a population-based study of the rates and risk factors for Alzheimer's disease among elderly from African-American and Caribbean Hispanic communities. In 2007, he was part of a group of scientists which discovered that genetic variants in the sortilin-related receptor, SORL1, were related to Alzheimer's disease. Dr. Mayeux also leads the National Institute on Aging Late-Onset Alzheimer’s Disease Family study.

In addition to his other leadership roles, Dr. Mayeux is director of Columbia’s Sergievsky Center, a center devoted to the epidemiologic investigation of neurological diseases, and director of the Memory Disorders Center at the New York State Psychiatric Institute.

He has authored more than 320 papers, chapters and books dealing with various aspects of Alzheimer’s disease and other degenerative diseases of the aging brain.

In 2000, Dr. Mayeux was elected to the Institute of Medicine of the National Academies, and in 2007, was the recipient of the Potamkin Award for research on Alzheimer's disease and related disorders from the American Academy of Neurology. He was also awarded the John M. Sterns Lifetime Achievement Award in Medicine from the New York Academy of Medicine in 2008.

Dr. Mayeux is a fellow of the American Academy of Neurology and the New York Academy of Science, and a member of the American Neurological Association and the Association of American Physicians. In addition, Dr. Mayeux is a member of the Association for Research in Nervous and Mental Disease, Society for Epidemiologic Research and Society for Neuroscience. He has also served as a member of the Aging Review and the Epidemiology of Chronic Disorders Committees for the National Institutes of Health and the Medical and Scientific Advisory Board for the Alzheimer’s Association.

Dr. Mayeux co-directs the Taub Institute for Research on Alzheimer’s Disease and the Aging Brain with Michael Shelanski, MD, PhD.

The Taub Institute for Research on Alzheimer’s Disease and the Aging Brain at Columbia University Medical Center is a multidisciplinary group that has forged links between researchers and clinicians to uncover the causes of Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s and other age-related brain diseases and discover ways to prevent and cure these diseases. It has partnered with the Gertrude H. Sergievsky Center, which was established by an endowment in 1977, to focus on diseases of the nervous system. The Center integrates traditional epidemiology with genetic analysis and clinical investigation to explore all phases of diseases of the nervous system. For more information about these centers visit: http://www.cumc.columbia.edu/dept/taub/ and http://www.cumc.columbia.edu/dept/sergievsky/

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 and Surgeons was the first institution in the country to grant the M.D. degree and is 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, visit www.cumc.columbia.edu.

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