[All Institutions]

Senior and New Scholars Awards for Salk Institute for Biological Studies


Dr. Fred H. Gage

Salk Institute for Biological Studies

Mechanisms of Age-related decline in Adult neurogenesis

2010 senior Scholar Award in aging
A specific feature of the hippocampus, a major brain region involved in learning and memory processes, is the continuous production of new neurons from neural stem cells (NSCs). Most of the newborn cells become neurons and eventually become microscopically indistinguishable from the other surrounding granule cells as they participate in... more >>

Dr. Juan Carlos Izpisua Belmonte

Salk Institute for Biological Studies

Using iPSC from HGPS patient fibroblasts to study ageing and dedifferentiation of senescence cells

2010 senior Scholar Award in aging

Despite the importance of ageing studies, we are still lacking appropriate cell models that can mimic normal human ageing to study ageing-related human diseases. Very recently, striking similarities between physiological ageing and the premature-ageing disease Hutchinson-Gilford Progeria Syndrome (HGPS) have been reported. HGPS is caused by the... more >>

Dr. Martin Hetzer

Salk Institute for Biological Studies

Role of Nuclear Pore Complex Deterioration in Aging

2009 senior Scholar Award in aging
Changes in gene activity are part of the cellular aging process, however, the mechanisms that cause age-related alterations in gene expression are poorly understood. We have recently discovered that nuclear pore complexes (NPCs), essential multiprotein channels that mediate molecular trafficking between the nucleoplasm and cytoplasm of eukaryotic... more >>

Dr. Inder M. Verma

Salk Institute for Biological Studies

Novel Gene Delivery Methods in the Brain

2006 senior Scholar Award in aging
We are developing methods that can introduce therapeutic genetic material into the brain to slow down the progression of degenerative diseases linked to aging. We propose to use regulatable lentiviral vectors to deliver genes into specific areas of the brain by stereotaxic injections. Since the lentiviral vectors integrate into the chromosomes... more >>

Dr. Stephen F. Heinemann

Salk Institute for Biological Studies

Alzheimer's disease: New Approaches to Therapy

2005 senior Scholar Award in aging

During the last year we made a surprising discovery that could lead to a new approach to developing a therapeutic drug to treat Alzheimer's disease. We plan to follow up on this discovery to elucidate the molecular mechanism of Alzheimer's disease in order to develop new molecular targets for drug development.

There is emerging evidence... more >>

Dr. Victoria Lundblad

Salk Institute for Biological Studies

Translating Yeast Telomere Biology to Human Cells: Identification of Activities that Regulate Human Telomere Maintenance and Cellular Proliferation

2001 senior Scholar Award in aging
The telomeric caps at the ends of chromosomes are essential for maintaining the integrity of eukaryotic genomes. Two processes must be fully operational in order to prevent telomere dysfunction: chromosome ends need to be fully replicated and these termini also need to be protected from the activities that normally act on DNA strand breaks. The... more >>

Dr. Xin Jin

Salk Institute for Biological Studies

Action learning and nigrostriatal circuits in the senescent brain

2012 new Scholar Award in aging

Motor decline is one of most severe phenotypes in normal aging. As we get older, we move and respond slower, performing actions with less precision and more variance. The nigral dopaminergic system and the striatum, which are critically involved in action learning and motor control (as evidenced both from animal research and human patients with... more >>

Dr. D. Leanne Jones

Salk Institute for Biological Studies

Control of Germline Stem Cell Behavior During Aging

2005 new Scholar Award in aging

Loss of tissue and organ function is a characteristic of organismal aging, and such changes have been attributed to decreases in stem cell function. Stem cells are the building blocks during development of organisms as varied as plants and humans. In addition, stem cells provide for the maintenance and regeneration of tissues, such as blood,... more >>

Dr. Andrew G. Dillin

Salk Institute for Biological Studies

Regulation of Aging by Insulin/IGF-1 and Mitochondrial Signaling Pathways

2004 new Scholar Award in aging

While aging has long been recognized as an interesting phenomenon, it is only recently that it has become the subject of genetic analysis. This principally derives from the observation that single gene mutations in yeast, worms, flies and mice can markedly increase the life span of these organisms.

Which gene networks function to... more >>

Funded Institutions

The Ellison Medical Foundation fosters research by means of grants-in-aid on behalf of investigators to universities and laboratories within the United States. Institutions receiving awards must be tax-exempt 501(c)(3) organizations or U.S. colleges or universities.