Peter Davies (1948 - 2020) was a Welsh scientist and active researcher. He was the head and director of the Litwin-Zucker Research Center for The Study of Alzheimer's disease and memory disorders, associated with the

Feinstein Institute for Medical Research The Feinstein Institutes for Medical Research in Manhasset, Nassau County, New York, United States, on Long Island, constitute the research arm of Northwell Health. Feinstein is home to 50 research labs, 2,500 clinical research studies, and 5,00 ...

Manhasset, New York Manhasset is a Hamlet (New York), hamlet and census-designated place (CDP) in Nassau County, New York, Nassau County, on the North Shore (Long Island), North Shore of Long Island, in New York (state), New York. It is considered the anchor communi ...

, US.

Education

Davies received his BSc (Hons., 1st class) and PhD, both in

biochemistry Biochemistry or biological chemistry is the study of chemical processes within and relating to living organisms. A sub-discipline of both chemistry and biology, biochemistry may be divided into three fields: structural biology, enzymology and ...

, from the

University of Leeds , mottoeng = And knowledge will be increased , established = 1831 – Leeds School of Medicine1874 – Yorkshire College of Science1884 - Yorkshire College1887 – affiliated to the federal Victoria University1904 – University of Leeds , ...

in 1971 and 1974, respectively. He was a post-doctoral fellow in the Department of Pharmacology at the

University of Edinburgh The University of Edinburgh ( sco, University o Edinburgh, gd, Oilthigh Dhùn Èideann; abbreviated as ''Edin.'' in post-nominals) is a public research university based in Edinburgh, Scotland. Granted a royal charter by King James VI in 15 ...

, Scotland, before joining the staff of the Medical Research Council Brain Metabolism Unit in Edinburgh in 1974, where he began his research on

Alzheimer's disease Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a neurodegeneration, neurodegenerative disease that usually starts slowly and progressively worsens. It is the cause of 60–70% of cases of dementia. The most common early symptom is difficulty in short-term me ...

Academic appointments

In 1977, Davies moved to

Albert Einstein College of Medicine Albert Einstein College of Medicine is a research-intensive medical school located in the Morris Park neighborhood of the Bronx in New York City. Founded in 1953, Einstein operates as an independent degree-granting institution as part of t ...

the Bronx The Bronx () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Bronx County, in the state of New York. It is south of Westchester County; north and east of the New York City borough of Manhattan, across the Harlem River; and north of the New Y ...

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

, where he was an assistant professor from 1977 to 1981, an associate professor from 1981 to 1986, and a professor from 1986 to date. He became the scientific director of the Litwin-Zucker Center for Research on Alzheimer's disease at the

North Shore-LIJ Health System Northwell Health is a nonprofit integrated healthcare network that is New York State's largest healthcare provider and private employer, with more than 81,000 employees. The flagship hospitals of Northwell are North Shore University Hosp ...

, in 2006.

Principal scientific contributions

Davies' research was focused on the biochemistry of Alzheimer's disease. His early work was in the development of the currently approved drugs for Alzheimer's disease: Aricept,

Exelon Exelon Corporation is an American Fortune 100 energy company headquartered in Chicago, Illinois and incorporated in Pennsylvania. It generates revenues of approximately $33.5 billion and employs approximately 33,400 people. Exelon is the larges ...

and Razodyne. He was interested in the pathway of Alzheimer's disease, and said that the disease may be a process of uncontrolled

cell cycle The cell cycle, or cell-division cycle, is the series of events that take place in a cell that cause it to divide into two daughter cells. These events include the duplication of its DNA (DNA replication) and some of its organelles, and subs ...

division. He had evidence that the switch that drives the cell cycle of

neurons A neuron, neurone, or nerve cell is an electrically excitable cell that communicates with other cells via specialized connections called synapses. The neuron is the main component of nervous tissue in all animals except sponges and placozoa. N ...

, which is a one-time event when the neuron is born, is somehow tripped and reactivated late in life. He and his team designed an experiment to turn on the cell cycle in laboratory models. They put a viral

oncogene An oncogene is a gene that has the potential to cause cancer. In tumor cells, these genes are often mutated, or expressed at high levels.

into differentiated neurons and watched as pathological events progressed. In 2004 Davies and his collaborators identified a marker in

cerebrospinal fluid Cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) is a clear, colorless body fluid found within the tissue that surrounds the brain and spinal cord of all vertebrates. CSF is produced by specialised ependymal cells in the choroid plexus of the ventricles of the bra ...

(CSF) that can distinguish Alzheimer's disease from normal

ageing Ageing ( BE) or aging ( AE) is the process of becoming older. The term refers mainly to humans, many other animals, and fungi, whereas for example, bacteria, perennial plants and some simple animals are potentially biologically immortal. In ...

, as well as discriminate between Alzheimer's and other forms of

dementia Dementia is a disorder which manifests as a set of related symptoms, which usually surfaces when the brain is damaged by injury or disease. The symptoms involve progressive impairments in memory, thinking, and behavior, which negatively affe ...

. The overall goal of Davies' research was to develop treatments to slow or halt the progression of Alzheimer's disease.

Awards and honors

* International Congress on Alzheimer's Disease (ICAD) Lifetime Achievement Award *

Metlife Foundation Award for Medical Research in Alzheimer's Disease The Metlife Foundation Award for Medical Research in Alzheimer's Disease were awarded annually from 1986 to 2016 to recognize scientific contributions toward a better understanding of the underlying causes, prevention, and treatments of Alzheimer's ...

(1986) *

National Institute of Health The National Institutes of Health, commonly referred to as NIH (with each letter pronounced individually), is the primary agency of the United States government responsible for biomedical and public health research. It was founded in the late 1 ...

(NIH) MERIT award NIMH, 1989–1999 * National Institute of Health (NIH) MERIT award NIA, 2003–2013 * Author of over 250 published research papers * The Bahbhani award for scientific achievement * The 2012 Long Island Alzheimer's Foundation (LIAF) award * The 2015

Potamkin Prize The Potamkin Prize for Research in Pick's, Alzheimer's, and Related Diseases was established in 1988 and is sponsored by the American Academy of Neurology. The prize is funded through the philanthropy of the Potamkin Foundation. The prize is awarded ...

for research in Pick's, Alzheimer's, and related diseases

Selected publications

* Hampel H, Buerger K, Zinkowski R, Goernitz A, Teipel SJ, Andreasen N, Sjogren M, DeBernardis J, Kerkman D, Ishiguro K, Ohno H, Vanmechelen E, Vanderstichele H, McCulloch C, Möller HJ, Davies P, Blennow K. "Measurement of phosphorylated tau epitopes in the differential diagnosis of Alzheimer disease – a comparative CSF study", ''Archives of General Psychiatry'', 61; 95–102, 2004 * Conrad C. Vianna C. Schultz C. Thal DR. Ghebremedhin E. Lenz J. Braak H. Davies P. "Molecular Evolution and Genetics of the Saitohin Gene and tau haplotype in Alzheimer's Disease and Argyrophilic Grain Disease". ''J Neurochem'', 89, 179–188, 2004. * Bargorn S. Davies P. Mandelkow E. "Tau paired helical filaments from Alzheimer's disease brain and assembled in vitro are based on beta-structure in the core domain", ''Biochemistry'' 43, 1694–1703, 2004. * Andorfer CA. Acker CM. Kress Y. Hof PR. Duff K. Davies P. "Cell Cycle Re-entry and Cell Death in Transgenic Mice Expressing Non-Mutant Human Tau Isoforms", ''J Neurosci'' 25; 5446–5454, 2005. * Marambaud P. Zhao H. Davies P. "Resveratrol promotes clearance of Alzheimer's disease amyloid-beta peptides", ''J Biol Chem'' 280, 37377–37382, 2005. * de Leon MJ. DeSanti S. Zinkowski R. Mehta PD. Pratico D. Segala S. Rusinek H. Lia J. Tsui W. Saint Louis LA. Clark CM. Tarshish C. Lia Y. Lair L. Javier E. Rich K. Lesbre P. Mosconi L. Reisberg B. Sadowski M. DeBernadis JF. Kerkman DJ. Hampel H. Wahlund L-O. Davies P. "Longitudinal CSF and MRI biomarkers improve the diagnosis of mild cognitive impairment", ''Neurobiology of Aging'' 27, 394–401, 2006. * d’Abramo C. Ricciarelli R. Pronzato MA. Davies P. "Troglitazone, a Peroxisome Proliferator-activated Receptor-gamma agonist, decreases tau phosphorylation in CHOtau4R cells", ''J. Neurochem'' 98, 1068–1077, 2006. * Park KHJ. Hallows JL Chakrabarty P Davies P Vincent I. "Conditional neuronal SV40 T Antigen expression induces Alzheimer-like tau and amyloid pathology in mice", ''J Neurosci'' 27, 2969–2978, 2007. * Espinoza M. de Silva R. Dickson DW. Davies P. "Differential Incorporation of Tau Isoforms in Alzheimer's Disease", ''Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease'', 14, 1–16, 2008.

References

External links

YouTube
{{DEFAULTSORT:Davies, Peter 1948 births 2020 deaths Alzheimer's disease researchers Welsh scientists Alumni of the University of Leeds Alumni of the University of Edinburgh 20th-century Welsh scientists 21st-century Welsh scientists People from Tredegar