USA2 SPOTLIGHT  

A September 13, 2016 The Hill article profiled UsAgainstAlzheimer’s co-founders Trish and George Vradenburg and their efforts to stop the spread of Alzheimer’s. According  to the profile, “Over the last six years, Trish and George Vradenburg have been working relentlessly to create a movement around Alzheimer’s disease. The couple ultimately hopes to eliminate the stigma associated with the condition and raise it up in the public discourse among other deadly diseases such as cancer and HIV/AIDS…The couple founded UsAgainstAlzheimer’s in 2010, and the group now consists of various networks aimed at connecting activists, researchers, faith-based groups, the pharmaceutical industry and other Alzheimer’s-serving organizations.”

MUST READS 

A September 12, 2016 The Washington Post opinion piece by Jena McGregor called Deloitte’s new “family leave” policy a smart idea. According McGregor, “Even more important: It has the potential to "normalize" caregiving, making it okay for single people, men, senior executives -- anyone -- to take a block of time off to care for an ailing family member or a new child…By making a similar amount of family leave available to everyone -- not just parents -- Deloitte is taking that idea a step further. At least in theory, it's just as possible that the 45-year-old single guy whose elderly mother has Alzheimer's could ask for several months off as it is that a 35-year-old woman who is pregnant could. That could help change the calculus managers do when thinking about whom to hire or advance, since older workers and men could also use the time.”

RESEARCH, SCIENCE, AND TECHNOLOGY 

A September 12, 2016 Alzheimer’s News Today article reported that “The National Institutes of Health’s recent $40 million award over the next five years will provide a new stage of research for the Alzheimer’s Disease Neuroimaging Initiative (ADNI), an NIH public-private partnership.” 

A September 12, 2016 Science Daily article highlighted the use of lasers to examine plaque formation. According to the article, “To help fight this deadly disease, Lisa Lapidus, Michigan State University professor of physics and astronomy, has found that peptides, or strings of amino acids, related to Alzheimer's wiggle at dangerous speeds prior to clumping or forming the plaques commonly associated with Alzheimer’s.”

A September 12, 2016 Neurology Advisor article reported that “Exposure to the blood of young mice almost completely restored synaptic and neuronal protein levels in Alzheimer's disease (AD) model mice, results from a study published in JAMA Neurology indicate.”