U of T neuroscientist receives Dan David Prize in Tel Aviv, Israel

University of Toronto Professor Peter St George-Hyslop was honoured with one of three international Dan David Prizes in a ceremony in Israel on Sunday, May 18.

The award recognizes St George-Hyslop’s research on Alzheimer’s disease, in particular his identification of two genes that play a role in the early onset and late stages of the disease.

“This award is a great honour, and a recognition of the many outstanding researchers with whom I’ve had the privilege to collaborate,” said St George-Hyslop, director of the Tanz Centre for Research in Neurodegenerative Diseases at U of T. “Today, we have a much deeper understanding of the molecular basis of neurodegenerative diseases than we did a generation ago, and this new knowledge has enabled many promising lines of investigation into better diagnoses and treatments.”

St George-Hyslop, who is also the Wellcome Trust Principal Research Fellow at the Department of Clinical Neurosciences at the University of Cambridge, was the first to discover key mutations in proteins involved in the early onset of Alzheimer’s. Scientists believe these proteins also play a role in the late onset of the disease.

St George-Hyslop’s lab is now pursuing new therapies based on the molecular mechanisms of Alzheimer’s, which they hope will limit symptoms of the disease, which include memory loss, cognitive decline and behaviour changes.

“Dementia and other neurodegenerative disorders present highly complex scientific and clinical challenges,” said Professor Catharine Whiteside, dean of the Faculty of Medicine at U of T. “But the passion and ingenuity of researchers like Peter St George-Hyslop is turning the tide on these diseases, and will continue to provide more and better treatment options for patients around the world.

“We are thrilled that the Dan David Foundation has recognized Peter’s extraordinary contributions to brain science.”

The annual Dan David Prizes recognize academic advances in the three time dimensions: past, present and future. St George-Hyslop shares this year’s “present” prize, themed “Combatting Memory Loss,” with two other researchers: Professor John Hardy of University College London and Professor Brenda Milner of McGill University.This year, the Dan David Prizes for the past and future dimensions recognized achievements in “History and Memory” and “Artificial Intelligence, the “Digital Mind,” respectively. A total of seven academics were honoured for their work in the ceremony, which took place at Tel Aviv University.

Named after the late businessman and philanthropist Dan David, the prizes celebrate research that moves beyond traditional academic disciplines to improve the world, and which reflects the values of excellence, creativity, justice, democracy and progress. Winners of the prize donate 10 per cent of their award money to 20 doctoral and postdoctoral scholarships.