Pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) is to invest €14.6 million in a major research study of Alzheimer's disease at Trinity College, Dublin (TCD) and NUI Galway. The project, also supported by the IDA, is one of the largest industry-led investments of its kind yet seen here.
The five-year programme will look at new treatments and drug therapies to combat the neuro-degenerative disorder, which affects about five million Europeans aged over 65, costing more than €55 billion to treat every year.
"[ Alzheimer's] will be one of the largest socioeconomic burdens in the coming decades," Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment, Micheál Martin, said at yesterday's announcement at TCD. The project will see GSK and IDA money invested in research at Trinity's Institute of Neuroscience and Galway's neuroscience centre.
"This project represents the kind of model we want to see in the future," Mr Martin said yesterday. It would be a "groundbreaking project", he said.
The project would allow dozens of young post-doctoral and postgraduate researchers to pursue research in the Institute of Neuroscience, said Trinity's principal investigator for the GSK project, Dr Shane O'Mara.
GSK employs more than 1,600 people in Cork, Dublin and Waterford. Last year, GSK, with the IDA and Science Foundation Ireland, announced a €13.7 million investment in research at University College Cork's Alimentary Pharmabiotic Centre to study gastrointestinal diseases.
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