Established at Columbia University in 1977 by a grant from the Samuel and May Rudin Foundation, the Samuel Rudin Distinguished Visiting Professorship program today serves as an important vehicle for the exchange of scientific knowledge among Columbia University, the greater New York City community, and academic institutions from around the world.

Since the inception of the Rudin visiting professorship program, Columbia has welcomed into the Rudin professorship program nearly 50 leading scholars, scientists, researchers, and medical practitioners, representing thirty-plus world-renowned scientific and medical institutions and nine countries worldwide.

2011 - 2012 EVENTS

Peter St George-Hyslop, MD, FRCP(C), FRS
Professor of Experimental Neuroscience, University of Cambridge
University Professor, Department of Medicine, University of Toronto

Lecture 1: "Genetic of Alzheimer's Disease and Related Dementias"
Tuesday, September 18, 2012
4:30 p.m.
Alumni Auditorium,
Room 401
650 West 168th Street, First Floor

Lecture 2: "A Neurologist's View of the Structural Biology of the Presenilin Complex”
Wednesday, September 19, 2012
4:30 p.m.
Alumni Auditorium
650 West 168th Street, First Floor

Dr. St George-Hyslop is professor of experimental neuroscience in the Department of Clinical Neurosciences at the University of Cambridge and university professor in the Department of Medicine (Division of Neurology) at the University of Toronto. He has worked on the molecular genetics, molecular biology and cell biology of several neurodegenerative diseases, including, most notably, Alzheimer's disease. He identified numerous genes associated with risk for Alzheimer's disease, including APP, PS1, PS2, APOE, SORL1 and most recently MS4A4/MS4A6E, CD2AP, CD33, and EPHA1. He used these genes to work out some of the early events in the pathogenesis of Alzheimer's disease, showing that a common feature of mutations in these genes is the accumulation of the amyloid ?-peptide. Most recently he has developed a small, drug-like molecule to inhibit the toxic aggregation of amyloid. This compound, which he has validated in transgenic mouse models, is currently in human clinical trials. St George-Hyslop's work has also led to breakthroughs in basic biology of neurodegenerative diseases - especially Alzheimer's disease, Frontotemporal dementia and Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis / Motor Neuron Disease. Thus, his work on the presenilins (PS1 and PS2) led to the discovery that they were components of a novel multi-subunit enzyme complex that plays a critical role in the regulated intramembranous proteolytic cleavage of APP to generate the neurotoxic A? peptide. Dr. St George-Hyslop's honors include: Francis A. McNaughton Prize from the Canadian Neurological Society; Potamkin Prize from the American Academy of Neurology; Award for Medical Research from the Metropolitan Life Foundation; Medical Research Council of Canada Scholar and Distinguished Scientist Awards; Gold Medal in Medicine from the Royal College of Physicians of Canada; Michael Smith Award from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research; and the Oon Prize in Medicine from the University of Cambridge. He is a Howard Hughes International Scholar, Wellcome Trust Principal research fellow. St George-Hyslop is a fellow of The Royal Society, fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences, fellow of the Society of Biology, and he is a foreign member of the Institute of Medicine of the U.S. National Academies of Science.

2011-12
David Baltimore, Ph.D., California Institute of Technology

2008-09
Eric Olson, Ph.D., UT Southwestern Medical Center at Dalles
View Lecture Video

2007-08
Thomas C. Südhof, M.D., UT Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas

2005-06
Jeffrey I. Gordon, M.D., Washington University School of Medicine

2004-05
Ronald M. Evans, Ph.D., The Salk Institute, Howard Hughes Medical Institute

2003-04
Dr. Michael Karin, University of California, San Diego

2002-03
Dr. Roderick Mackinnon, Rockefeller University

2001-02
Eric S. Lander, Ph.D., Whitehead Institute/MIT Center for Genome Research,
Massachusetts Institute of Technology

2000-01
Richard Losick, Ph.D., Harvard University

1999-00
Donald A. Henderson, Johns Hopkins University

1998-99
Robert W. Mahley, University of California at San Francisco
Charles Weissman, University of Surich, Imperial College of Science, Technology and Medicine, London, England

1995-96
Laurie H. Glimcher, Harvard University
Francis S. Collins, National Institutes of Health

1997-98
James E. Rothman, Memorial Sloan-Kettering Institute

1994-95
Solomon H. Snyder, Johns Hopkins University
Alan Fersht, Cambridge University

1993-94
C. Thomas Caskey, Baylor College of Medicine
Michael E. Phelps, UCLA School of Medicine

1992-93
Olikoye Ransome-Kuti, Federal Republic of Nigeria
Thomas E. Starzl, University of Pittsburgh

1991-92
Jonathan Mann, Harvard Institute of Public Health, International AIDS Center, Boston, MA
Sydney Brenner, Molecular Genetics Unit, Cambridge, England

1990-91
Geoffrey Thorburn, Monash University, Clayton, Australia
Jonathan Beckwith, Harvard University

1989-90
Michael J. Berridge, University of Cambridge
Ira Herskowitz, University of California at San Francisco

1988-89
Friedrich Bonhoeffer, Max Planck Institut, Tubingen, West Germany
Marc W. Kirschner, University of California at Berkeley

1987-88
Sir Roy York Calne, University of Cambridge

1986-87
Alexander Borbély, University of Zurich
Piet Borst, The Netherlands Cancer Institute

1985-86
Tom Maniatis, Harvard University
Alexander Rich, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

1984-85
Kurt Wüthrich, Eidgenossische Technische, Hoschule, Zurich
Daniel E. Koshland, Jr., University of California at Berkeley

1983-84
Philippe Coumel, Hôpital Lariboisière, Paris
Joseph Martin, Harvard University

1982-83
Peter J. Morris, Oxford University
Keith R. Yamamoto, University of California at San Francisco

1977-78
Bruce N. Ames, University of California at Berkeley
Francis D. Moore, Harvard University
Baruj Benacerraf, Harvard University
David Mechanic, University of Wisconsin

1980-81
Harold M. Weintraub, University of Washington

1979-80
Charles Scriver, McGill University
Sir Richard Doll, Oxford University
Norman Geschwind, Harvard University

1978-79
Efraim Racker, Cornell University
Leo Sachs, Weizmann Institute
Rozella M. Schlotfeldt, Case Western Reserve University
Paul Lacy, Washington University, St. Louis