What is MSU's mission in fighting Alzheimer disease?
Alzheimer disease (AD) is the most common degenerative brain disease of aging in the world, affecting more than 6.7 million people in the United States. AD insidiously robs the affected of their memory and ultimately their identity as a human being. Here at MSU, our highest priority is developing treatments to slow or halt the symptoms of AD and related dementias.
How is MSU fulfilling this mission?
Michigan State University’s College of Human Medicine has recruited and empowered a world-class AD research team to discover the origins of the disease and translate this knowledge into a cure. Michigan State University’s AD team is an interdisciplinary and collaborative team of Cell, Protein and Molecular Biologists, Biochemists, Neuroanatomists, Pharmacologists, and Behavioral Scientists, all working toward the rapid development of new candidate therapies for AD. The team assembled at MSU is an integral component of the only National Institutes of Health (NIH) Alzheimer’s Disease Research Center sited in Michigan. MSU also serves as the co-host institution for the Michigan Center for Contextual Factors in Alzheimer’s Disease (MCCFAD), which is coordinated by the National Institute on Aging Resource Centers for Minority Aging Research (AD-RCMAR).
Michigan State University’s AD team is committed to addressing health disparities associated with Alzheimer disease and related dementias by working with communities with culturally diverse heritage. Our team trains the next generation of culturally diverse scientists and physicians.
What resources do we currently have to achieve our goals?
The pace of discovery depends on time, effort, and resources. The team has been successful in competing nationally for grant support from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) as well as private foundations like the Alzheimer’s Association. While such resources are the life blood of any competitive research program, they are typically earmarked for well researched, incremental development of existing projects.
Targeted acquisitions by faculty, the Department of Translational Neuroscience and the College of Human Medicine have resulted in common use clusters of high technology instrumentation and infrastructure unique in the state of Michigan to position our faculty for rapid progress.
What do we do to combat AD?
- We develop new blood tests to identify individuals at risk of AD and related dementias.
- We extend scientific understanding of how and why neurodegeneration develops and progresses.
- We investigate vascular and immune system contributions to dementia.
- We develop novel medications and therapies to halt or reverse the progress of neurodegeneration in the AD brain.
- We repurpose existing pharmaceuticals.
- We identify and develop unique neuroprotective agents to prevent the cell death associated with AD.
- We seek out treatments for the behavioral and psychological symptoms of dementia (BPSD), such as agitation, aggression, depression, psychosis and wandering, which compromise quality of life for people living with AD and their care partners.
- We collaborate with community organizations to support people living with dementia, especially in culturally diverse populations.
- We educate the next generation of scientists in the fight against AD and related dementias.