NOTE TO EDITORS: Photo available at http://today.uci.edu/news/media_advisory_detail.asp?key=320

EVENT:
Frank LaFerla, professor of neurobiology and behavior, will talk on "Winning the Battle Against Alzheimer's Disease: New Discoveries Offer New Hope." He will discuss the latest efforts by scientists to identify therapies for Alzheimer's, including his own breakthrough research on understanding and controlling the disease. The talk is part of the UC Irvine Distinguished Lecture Series on Brain, Learning and Memory, which is organized by the Center for the Neurobiology of Learning and Memory.

WHEN:
7:30 p.m. Wednesday, Jan. 17

WHERE:
Irvine Barclay Theatre, 4242 Campus Dr., Irvine, on the UCI campus. Map: www.uci.edu/campusmap

INFORMATION:
Free and open to the public. To be added to the lecture series mailing list, contact 949-824-4275 or memory@uci.edu.

BACKGROUND:
LaFerla's research focuses on understanding the physical progression of Alzheimer's disease, the most common form of dementia among the elderly. His laboratory has created mice that develop the brain lesions that characterize Alzheimer's, and scientists throughout the world now use these mice to research the disease. LaFerla and his colleagues recently identified a compound that blocks the disease's progression, and they discovered that stress hastens the progress of Alzheimer's in mice.

LaFerla is co-director of the Institute for Brain Aging and Dementia at UCI, and he is a fellow of the Center for the Neurobiology of Learning and Memory. He earned his doctorate in virology at the University of Minnesota and served as a postdoctoral fellow at the Holland Laboratory of the American Red Cross before moving to Irvine as an assistant professor in 1995. He has received several honors for his research accomplishments, including the 2005 MetLife Foundation Award for Medical Research.

Alzheimer's is a progressive neurodegenerative disorder that affects more than 4.5 million adults in the United States. With an aging population, that number could approach 20 million by 2050. Alzheimer's is the third-leading cause of death, behind cancer and heart disease. Five percent of people older than 65 have Alzheimer's, and up to one-half of people are affected by age 80.