The scholarship program for graduate students was created by the Clause family’s generous donation to Sanford Burnham Prebys.
Michael Alcaraz, a fourth-year graduate student in the Sanford Burnham Prebys Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences, was selected as the 2024 recipient of the Melvin and Phyllis McCardle Clause Scholarship.
“I am very excited about being chosen for this scholarship,” said Alcaraz. “I’ll be gaining mentorship opportunities from researchers in neuroscience that complement my lab’s focus on aging.
“This funding will make a big difference as my research moves forward. The scholarship also provides support for professional development, which will allow me to attend conferences to share what I’m studying and grow my network.”
The McCardle Clause Scholarship was established in honor of Phyllis McCardle Clause after her long struggle with Alzheimer’s disease (AD). The award supports graduate student education in age-related neurodegeneration within the Institute’s graduate school.
Alcaraz conducts research in the laboratory of Peter D. Adams, PhD, the director of the Cancer Genome and Epigenetics Program, with a focus on the mechanisms of aging.
With support from the scholarship, Alcaraz will be investigating the fundamental connections between aging and the increased risk of AD, the most common cause of dementia. His project is focused on the role of nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide (NAD+), an essential metabolite and building block for enzymes.
NAD+ levels decrease with age in several tissues, including in the brains of humans and mouse models of AD. The decline of this important metabolite is associated with insufficient energy metabolism that is a major hallmark of AD.
“In collaboration with the Conrad Prebys Center for Chemical Genomics, we will test a potential drug to promote production of NAD+ in the brain by activating a key enzyme involved in NAD+ biosynthesis,” said Alcaraz. The compound was developed by the Conrad Prebys Center for Chemical Genomics led by Michael Jackson, PhD, senior vice president of Drug Discovery and Development.
“The goal of my project is to raise the levels of NAD+ in mice suffering from an analogous condition to AD and test its effects on improving brain metabolism, function and behavior,” added Alcaraz.
“The objective is to build the preclinical foundation for one day achieving benefits for patients. We all know how devastating AD is for patients and families, and the need for new treatments grows greater every single day.
“This project will require a lot of collaboration between experts in aging, drug discovery, neuroscience and behavioral analysis. We have all this expertise available across the Institute, and I’m looking forward to working with an interdisciplinary team on this effort thanks to the generosity of the Clause family.”