Researchers Celebrate Impact of Award on Advances in Neurology

Staff from University College London, (UCL) and trustees of the Wolfson Foundation have recently celebrated the far-reaching impact of a £20 million grant that supported dementia research at the Leonard Wolfson Experimental Neurology Centre based at the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery in Queen Square, London.

The award made in December 2011 is the largest the Wolfson Foundation has ever made and one of the largest UCL has ever received. It created the UK’s only clinical research facility dedicated to experimental medicine in neurodegeneration, bringing together basic research, clinical research and doctoral training focused on understanding and disrupting diseases including dementia, motor neurone disease and Huntington’s disease.

In December 2016, UCL’s excellence in neuroscience research was recognised when it was announced that UCL would be the research hub and operational headquarters of the new £250m UK Dementia Research Institute. Speaking at the event, Professor Alan Thompson, Dean of the UCL Faculty of Brain Sciences, thanked the Wolfson Foundation for their generous investment that advanced UCL’s world-leading neuroscience research.

“When I was first appointed Dean in 2011, I said that I hoped we would see a substantial rise in profile and productivity in neuroscience in the coming years. Helping to establish the remarkable Leonard Wolfson Centre and now the hub of the UK DRI goes beyond what I imagined we could have achieved in the space of six years. I am incredibly proud to lead a centre that bears the name of Leonard Wolfson and our team is constantly inspired by the confidence entrusted in us by the Wolfson Foundation to make lives better," he said.