The Foundation for the National Institutes of Health’s (FNIH) Biomarkers Consortium said the results of a proteomics study performed using plasma samples from the Alzheimer’s Disease (AD) Neuroimaging Initiative (ADNI) are ready to be shared with scientists worldwide for further analysis.
The $60m Biomarkers Consortium project, which was launched in 2004 and concludes by the end of 2010, is a public-private partnership supported primarily by the NIH with pharmaceutical, imaging and clinical trial management companies; not-for-profit organisations; and donations from individuals providing support through the FNIH.
ADNI involves longitudinal magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and positron emission tomography (PET) brain imaging and blood, urine and spinal fluid biomarker studies of more than 800 individuals to diagnose AD and monitor disease progression.
A renewal of the ADNI effort was announced in October 2010 by the FNIH and National Institute on Aging, which will continue ADNI for an additional five years through late 2015.
Executive director and CEO of the FNIH Scott Campbell said the project provides further evidence that academia, industry, and government can work closely together on projects that require the input and involvement of these diverse sectors.
Bristol-Myers Squibb director of Clinical Neuroscience Biomarkers Holly Soares, who led the Biomarkers Consortium Project Team said hopefully, the data may someday lead to a blood-based screening test for early diagnosis and preventative treatment of AD.
John Trojanowski, who, with Leslie Shaw co-directs the ADNI Biomarker Core at the University of Pennsylvania, said this is another example of the efforts of ADNI and all ADNI stakeholders to make potentially valuable chemical biomarker data sets as broadly available to all scientists interested in Alzheimer biomarkers to accelerate the pace of biomarker discovery and validation for Alzheimer patients since this will have an important impact on the discovery and testing of disease modifying therapies for Alzheimer’s disease.
Financial support of this Biomarkers Consortium project was provided through funds allocated from the ADNI partnership raised by the Foundation for NIH, as well as additional direct support from Pfizer.