Alzheimer’s researchers await more funding

The numbers are enough to keep a scientist up at night. One anonymous donor, 850 blood samples waiting to be processed, $270,000 to fund Alzheimer’s research at UC Irvine and only a month and a half to raise matching funds.

“We have a unique opportunity to study the genetic factors behind Alzheimer’s. All the DNA is there waiting to be tested, we just need the funding,” said Steven Potkin, director of the UCI Brain Imaging Center.

Potkin has been involved since 2004 in a $60 million nationwide five-year study involving 850 patients on Alzheimer’s disease, the Alzheimer’s Disease Neuroimaging Initiative.

The study’s goal is to compare people with mild cognitive impairment and Alzheimer’s disease.

“Some people with mild cognitive impairment develop Alzheimer’s disease, while others don’t,” Potkin said. “We’re trying to understand why that is.”

Another important piece of the puzzle in studying Alzheimer’s are the genetics behind the disease, Potkin said. Blood samples from study participants were taken but no funding from the National Institutes of Health and private sources is earmarked for genetic testing.

Potkin and his colleagues at the Brain Imaging Center recently were promised $270,000 from an anonymous donor, provided matching donations of $540,000 could be raised by Nov. 1. Researchers have raised $460,000 toward the goal, including $100,000 from the National Institutes of Health, but are still scrambling to find additional funds.

“Steven is a brilliant researcher,” said Pat Carew, executive director of health science advancement at UCI. “One of the challenges of science is that sometimes the science takes you places where the funding doesn’t.”

Donations may be sent to Carew at 252 Irvine Hall, Irvine, CA, 926697 or call (949) 824-7910 for more information.

BRIANNA BAILEY may be reached at (714) 966-4625 or at brianna.bailey@latimes.com.