Here is what Texas’ leading Alzheimer’s researchers are saying about their participation in the Texas Alzheimer’s Research Consortium. . .


2007

University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas

Roger N. Rosenberg, MD, Director, Alzheimer’s Disease Center, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas.

I have been conducting clinical and molecular genetic research for 40 years – and on Alzheimer’s disease for 25 years, and I can honestly state that The Texas Alzheimer’s Research Consortium represents the greatest, most exciting opportunity for our neuroscientists and neurologists to conduct cutting edge, first-rate research into the biological causes of Alzheimer’s disease that I have ever experienced.

I believe we have designed the right and necessary experiments to discover the fundamental cause of Alzheimer’s disease. That information will lead us to directed thinking on what drugs to develop to begin the end of Alzheimer’s disease in our lifetime.

Alzheimer’s disease is a genetic disorder. The national research community is already aware that there are three genes that can cause half of the children of an Alzheimer’s parent to also develop the disease. The Consortium is looking for what we call "risk genes" – genes that increase the risk or susceptibility of individuals to develop Alzheimer’s. The single effects of these “risk genes” are small, but together they can overwhelm the normal metabolism of the brain to cause the devastating dementia of Alzheimer’s disease.

The discovery of these risk genes is vital for several reasons. If we are successful, then these genes can be targeted in the development of new therapeutic drugs. It will also be possible to identify individuals and families at risk for Alzheimer’s disease and get them medical attention very early in the disease process – perhaps even before symptoms occur, so they can start therapy in the earliest stages when it has the best chance of being effective

Baylor College of Medicine, Houston

Rachelle S. Doody, M.D., Ph.D., Effie Marie Cain Chair in Alzheimer’s Disease Research, Baylor College of Medicine.

At the Alzheimer’s Disease and Memory Disorders Center at Baylor, we have ongoing projects to study the way in which normal brains age, as well as studies to determine what factors make individuals more susceptible to developing Alzheimer’s disease and other dementias. We are also studying the factors that make Alzheimer’s disease progress rapidly in some patients, and much more slowly in others. We have used our understanding of Alzheimer’s disease and the factors that modify it to develop new treatment approaches, including lifestyle changes, drugs, and immunization approaches.

Within the framework of the Texas Alzheimer’s Research Consortium, advances of any one of the centers will now be translated into quickly testable research questions. Definitive research requires that a large number of individuals be studied in a relatively short time, and this is now possible because of the coordination provided by the research Consortium. Researchers will share ideas to advance their individual projects during the early stages of development, and will then propose methods for using the data, biological samples, or volunteers at all of the centers in order to complete these projects.

Everyone in the State potentially benefits. Researchers avoid costly mistakes or projects that are already being done – and generate new ideas. Patients and their loved ones benefit from the dissemination of information regarding what research is available at the centers, and they may even choose to volunteer for a specific project. Successful projects may some day lead to new methods of early diagnosis or to new treatments.

Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center in Lubbock

Randolph B. Schiffer, M.D., Chair, Department of Neuropsychiatry and Behavioral Science, Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center in Lubbock.
On behalf of Texas Tech, I want to thank the state’s leadership for their support of the Texas Consortium on Alzheimer’s Disease – and to assure our lawmakers and Texas taxpayers that what they receive in the way of scientific returns will far exceed their original investment in the Consortium.
In our work, we are learning that environmental factors and the life experiences of the individual also play a part in determining who gets Alzheimer’s disease, and to some extent, what course the disease will take.
We are contributing some of these variables to the shared research projects of the Consortium, so that we might better understand how environmental and lifestyle factors – which are potentially treatable or preventable – interact with genetic factors to produce the disease which we now call Alzheimer’s.

University of North Texas Health Science Center in Fort Worth
Janice A. Knebl, D.O., MBA, Director of the Gerontology and Assessment and Planning Program at the University of North Texas Health Science Center

UNT’s participation in the Texas Alzheimer’s Research Consortium is of major benefit to our patients and their family members. We are including their genetic and demographic profiles in our Consortium’s shared database – and thereby making it possible for our patients and those in small communities in different parts of the state to participate in cutting edge Alzheimer’s disease research that, otherwise, would not have been available to them.

The Consortium’s research data will provide a rich resource for learning more about the outcomes and effects of Alzheimer’s on patients and their caregivers. I am particularly interested in this issue – both as a researcher and as someone with a history of Alzheimer’s in my family. The Consortium’s research holds the best promise for achieving major breakthroughs in care and treatment of this disease.

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