U of L receives major Alzheimer’s research funding

Feb 2, 2022 | 2:31 PM

LETHBRIDGE, AB – The University of Lethbridge has received a grant of $918,000 over five years from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) for Alzheimer’s research.

Dr. Athan Zovoilis, Canada Research Chair in RNA Bioinformatics and Genomics at the University of Lethbridge, will continue his groundbreaking research into the molecular mechanisms involved in Alzheimer’s disease because of the grant.

Zovoilis, director of the Southern Alberta Genome Sciences Centre (SAGSC), is joined by Dr. Majid Mohajerani, co-investigator who holds the Dr. Bryan Kolb Professorship/Chair in Neuroscience, will both combine their expertise in genome sciences and neurodegeneration to help solve the mysteries of Alzheimer’s disease (AD).

Zovoilis says with an unpredictable disease, “the funding landscape is quite competitive and this support from CIHR is a great success for CCBN and SAGSC.”

“With no reliable cure for AD and an aging population, Canada is in great need of interdisciplinary, cutting-edge research on the disease and this funding could help us contribute to the development of new treatments.”

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In earlier work, Zovoilis and his team found a new molecular mechanism involved in Alzheimer’s disease in mice and confirmed the same mechanism is at work in people with the disease.

The U of L says his team used high throughput sequencing techniques that study the DNA readout of brain cells to identify a class of biomolecules, called SINE RNAs, that are produced in different patterns in AD patients versus healthy individuals.

Mohajerani, an expert in neural dynamics and memory systems, uses cutting-edge optical imaging devices, biosensors, and advanced behavioral methods to get a better understanding of how memory becomes impaired in AD.

With both doctors working in bioinformatics and genome sciences, the team hopes to determine how the increased processing of SINE RNAs is connected to AD by studying the relationship in real-time using a mouse model.

This news release can also be found online at Alzheimer’s research.

by Connor Gunn

U of L receives major Alzheimer’s research funding

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