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posted by martyb on Tuesday November 14 2017, @09:22PM   Printer-friendly
from the any-and-all-support-appreciated dept.

Microsoft founder Gates commits $100 million for fund, start-ups, to fight Alzheimer's

Billionaire Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates is to invest $50 million in the Dementia Discovery Fund, a venture capital fund that brings together industry and government to seek treatments for the brain-wasting disease. The investment is not part of Gates' philanthropic Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and will be followed with another $50 million in a number of start-up ventures working in Alzheimer's research, Gates said.

With rapidly rising numbers of people suffering from Alzheimer's and other forms of dementia, the disease is taking a growing emotional and financial toll as people live longer, Gates told Reuters in an interview. "It's a huge problem, a growing problem, and the scale of the tragedy - even for the people who stay alive - is very high," he said.

Despite decades of scientific research, there is no treatment that can slow the progression of Alzheimer's. Current drugs can do no more than ease some of the symptoms. Gates said, however, that with focused and well-funded innovation, he's "optimistic" treatments can be found, even if they might be more than a decade away.


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Related Stories

Pfizer Halts Research Into Alzheimer's and Parkinson's; Axovant Sciences Abandons Intepirdine 11 comments

Pfizer has announced that it will halt efforts to find new treatments for Alzheimer's and Parkinson's diseases. Meanwhile, Axovant Sciences will halt its studies of intepirdine after it failed to show any improvement for dementia and Alzheimer's patients. The company's stock price has declined around 90% in 3 months:

Pfizer has announced plans to end its research efforts to discover new drugs for Alzheimer's and Parkinson's diseases. The pharmaceutical giant explained its decision, which will entail roughly 300 layoffs, as a move to better position itself "to bring new therapies to patients who need them."

"As a result of a recent comprehensive review, we have made the decision to end our neuroscience discovery and early development efforts and re-allocate [spending] to those areas where we have strong scientific leadership and that will allow us to provide the greatest impact for patients," Pfizer said in a statement emailed to NPR.

[...] Despite heavily funding research efforts into potential treatments in the past, Pfizer has faced high-profile disappointment in recent years, as Reuters notes: "In 2012, Pfizer and partner Johnson & Johnson (JNJ.N) called off additional work on the drug bapineuzumab after it failed to help patients with mild to moderate Alzheimer's in its second round of clinical trials."

Another potential treatment for neurodegenerative disorders — this one developed by Axovant, another pharmaceutical company — also found itself recently abandoned. The company dropped its experimental drug intepirdine after it failed to improve motor function in patients with a certain form of dementia — just three months after it also failed to show positive effects in Alzheimer's patients.

Looks like GlaxoSmithKline got a good deal when they sold the rights to intepirdine to Axovant Sciences in 2014.

Also at Bloomberg.

Related: Can we Turn Back the Clock on Alzheimer's?
Possible Cure for Alzheimer's to be Tested Within the Next Three Years
Mefenamic Acid Might Cure Alzheimers - Generic Cost in US is Crazy
New Alzheimer's Treatment Fully Restores Memory Function in Mice
Power Outage in the Brain may be Source of Alzheimer's
Another Failed Alzheimer's Disease Therapy
The FDA Saved Taxpayers from Paying Billions for Ineffective Alzheimer's Therapy
Alzheimer's Disease: A "Whole Body" Problem?
Bill Gates Commits $100 Million to Alzheimer's Research
Evidence That Alzheimer's Protein Spreads Like an Infection


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Bill Gates Looks to Immunotherapy to Help Control All Infectious Diseases 15 comments

Bill Gates gave an address at J.P. Morgan's 36th Annual Healthcare Conference in San Francisco:

[There] is reason to hope that the insights uncovered in ongoing immunotherapy research for cancer will eventually help us control all infectious diseases. This would be a huge victory for humanity—and potentially a significant market for the life sciences.

Others seem to think so too. Venture capitalists like Bob Nelsen and Bob More have helped raise over $500 million for VIR Biotechnology—including funding from us—to discover and develop treatments for serious infectious diseases.

We are also investors in Immunocore, which is using T-cell technology to help stimulate the body's immune system. Initially, Immunocore's "T-cell receptor" technology targeted cancers, but it could also be applied against infectious diseases.

We are backing companies like CureVac and Moderna on mRNA approaches for vaccine and drug development, which have the potential to help us tackle cancer. This approach is also intriguing as a potential immunological intervention for HIV, malaria, flu and the Zika virus.

And mRNA vaccines are likely to be cheaper, easier, and faster to make than traditional vaccines. This would be particularly helpful in containing epidemics—whether they occur through nature or are the result of an intentional biological attack. Today, it typically takes up to 10 years to develop and license a new vaccine. To significantly curb deaths from a fast-moving airborne pathogen, we would have to get that down considerably—to 90 days or less.

Also at NBF.

Related: Bill Gates Commits $100 Million to Alzheimer's Research


Original Submission

Bill Gates Donates $40 Million for Genetic Research on Cows 45 comments

Bill Gates has donated $40 million to Scottish researchers trying to create a cow that can thrive in hotter conditions, such as those in Africa:

Tweaking genes could be one way of increasing the hardiness of some livestock breeds. By isolating desirable genetics traits from European and African cow breeds, geneticists hope to design a cow that produces high quantities of milk and is also able to withstand exceptionally high temperatures.

An Edinburgh-based nonprofit, GALVmed (Global Alliance for Livestock Veterinary Medicines) just received $40 million from Bill Gates to conduct genetic research with this aim in mind. "You can have a cow that is four times as productive with the same survivability," Gates told the Times.

The philanthropist told the BBC that he was investing in the nonprofit's research because "there is great [...] understanding here of both animal diseases and how we can treat it, and how we enhance the genetics so that you can get, say the same type of milk or egg productivity that we have in the U.K."

Related: Bill Gates Commits $100 Million to Alzheimer's Research
Bill Gates Invests $80 Million in Arizona "Smart City"
Bill Gates Looks to Immunotherapy to Help Control All Infectious Diseases


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  • (Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 14 2017, @09:35PM (5 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 14 2017, @09:35PM (#596997)

    Sorry to bother, can someone please remind me who is Bill Gates?

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 14 2017, @09:49PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 14 2017, @09:49PM (#597004)

      I think he's known for Oracle Databases or so...

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 14 2017, @10:08PM (3 children)

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 14 2017, @10:08PM (#597011)

      He is the Gate Keeper, he seeks the Key Master so that he can set up access to the back door. Soon Dozer will reap all humanity that falls below \/$.iq/\pol^ and destroy the pitiful clones of the B.S.D

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 14 2017, @10:45PM (1 child)

        by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 14 2017, @10:45PM (#597030)

        and destroy the pitiful clones of the B.S.D

        Nah, the whats-its-name, eye... eyePricklypear or whatever has more money stashed away than that Oracle guy.

        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 14 2017, @10:51PM

          by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 14 2017, @10:51PM (#597037)

          No no, it isn't about money. Do you even mythologize?

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 14 2017, @11:58PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 14 2017, @11:58PM (#597064)

        Wasn't Dozer the Brother of Tank, who served on the Nebuchadnezzar under Morpheus? Why would he reap? Sounds just like the thinking of a machine, to me.

  • (Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 14 2017, @11:02PM (5 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 14 2017, @11:02PM (#597043)

    The fucker realized he's going senile. Motherfucker.

    • (Score: 4, Insightful) by PinkyGigglebrain on Wednesday November 15 2017, @12:16AM (4 children)

      by PinkyGigglebrain (4458) on Wednesday November 15 2017, @12:16AM (#597067)

      more likely his dad has been diagnosed, and since Alzheimers is hereditary Bill is hoping to avoid his fathers fate.

      As much as I would have liked to believe that BG's motives are altruistic I just can't. I've head too many verified stories about what Gates has done over the years, some from even before he founded Microsoft, to ever believe there isn't some angle he is playing to benefit himself.

      --
      "Beware those who would deny you Knowledge, For in their hearts they dream themselves your Master."
      • (Score: 2) by Gaaark on Wednesday November 15 2017, @12:37AM

        by Gaaark (41) on Wednesday November 15 2017, @12:37AM (#597074) Journal

        Basically what I think.

        Guy. Is. A. Douche.

        --
        --- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
      • (Score: 5, Insightful) by Grishnakh on Wednesday November 15 2017, @04:45AM (2 children)

        by Grishnakh (2831) on Wednesday November 15 2017, @04:45AM (#597159)

        The guy is definitely a selfish asshole, but this is one place where ultra-rich assholes really can help humanity, because they're subject to the same biological weaknesses that the rest of us are. Notice that other silicon-valley billionaires are pouring money into other anti-aging research, because they want to be immortal. If it works out and age-related diseases (Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, etc.) have excellent new treatment devised or they're even cured, or human lifespan is really extended to some degree, that'll benefit all of us, not just the billionaire assholes.

        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 15 2017, @12:00PM

          by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 15 2017, @12:00PM (#597258)

          The anti-aging whims of the 50 year old silicon valley billionaire are great for 20 year olds.

        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 16 2017, @08:05AM

          by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 16 2017, @08:05AM (#597610)

          Except the treatments will be highly proprietary and completely secret and cost $17 million per shot...

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