Summer 2009 Faculty Altruism Turkish-Israeli Relations Mathematical Superstars TEL AVIV UNIVERSITY REVIEW A dose of Drug Development ptimism Pipeline Leads through TAU Cover Story: Doing the Math 16 Students of TAU's Gifted Program for A Dose Youth in Mathematics and Computer Science are reaping the top prizes at of Optimism 2 international competitions. With 20 different projects for drugs and medical devices coming down the pipeline, TAU researchers are playing a What Keeps major role in the development of remedies for devastating Turkish-Israeli diseases. Relations Going? 18 TAU Middle East expert Prof. Ofra Beyond the Bengio believes that Call of Duty 12 the current The Dalai Lama presents an coolness TEL AVIV UNIVERSITY REVIEW international humanitarian award Summer 2009 between the two countries will not to Dr. Galia Sabar, one of the many permanently damage relations. TAU faculty members who volunteer Issued by the Marketing and Donor Relations Dept. their time and skills to people who Development and Public Affairs Division need them. Tel Aviv University That Sinking Ramat Aviv 69978 Tel Aviv, Israel Feeling 21 A TAU researcher and Nato team Tel: +972 3 6408249 develop a way to predict sinkholes in Fax: + 972 3 6407080 the Dead Sea area. E-mail: [email protected] www.tau.ac.il Editorial staff for TAU Review and Insider Editor: Louise Shalev Contributors: Rava Eleasari, Talma Agron, Pauline Reich, Ruti Ziv, Michal Alexander, Karin Kloosterman, Carl Hoffman, Gil Zohar, Esther Singer Graphic Design: TAU Graphics Design Studio/ Michal Semo-Kovetz; Dalit Pessach Dio’olamot Photography: Development and Public Affairs Division sections Photography Department/Michal Roche Ben Ami, Michal Kidron Additional Photography: Yoram Reshef, Arie Shaus, innovations 20 Israel Yosef, Sheila Shalhevet, Ofir Lotan, Dan Porges, AP, Michael Yamashita, Vicky Mack, Miri Gatennyo inside S1 Administrative Coordinator: Pauline Reich digest 25 Supplement: News on major Administrative Assistants: Roy Polad, Shani Shaflan Tel Aviv University supporters, Translation Services: Sagir Translations projects and Friends’ activities. Printing: Eli Meir Printing newsmakers 31 a Officers of Tel Aviv University Robert Goldberg Chairman of the Board of Governors Dr. Leora Meridor Chairperson of the Executive Council Prof. Zvi Galil President Prof. Dany Leviatan Rector Mordehai Kohn Director-General Prof. Ehud Gazit Vice President for Research and Development Dr. Gary Sussman Vice President for Development and Public Affairs Dear friends, Yehiel Ben-Zvi Vice President Can Tel Aviv University revolutionize medical treatment with its scientific ad- Dr. Raymond R. Sackler, Michael H. Steinhardt vances? We aspire to no less than that. We Honorary Chairmen of the Board of Governors have been investing significant resources in building new, world-class Dr. h.c. Karl Heinz-Kipp, laboratories; recruiting innovative young researchers from top insti- Deputy Chairman of the Board of Governors tutions such as the NIH and Harvard; awarding fellowships to our Dr. h.c. Josef Buchmann, Stewart M. Colton, François Heilbronn, most talented master’s and doctoral students; and dedicating the time Dr. h.c. Raya Jaglom, John Landerer AM CBE, and energies of our professionals at Ramot, TAU’s technology trans- Adolfo Smolarz, Melvin S. Taub fer arm, to developing the business potential of campus discoveries. Vice Chairpersons of the Board of Governors Our mandate is to create a better and healthier world. If the appli- Prof. Aron Shai cation and commercialization of the university’s intellectual property Vice Rector translates into revenues, all the better: we can and do channel this Prof. Shimon Yankielowicz income back into our research effort. Pro-Rector Prof. Hannah Naveh In this issue of TAU Review, we focus on discoveries that demon- Dean of the Yolanda and David Katz strate the highest potential for development into breakthrough thera- Faculty of the Arts pies. We are introducing a new section that features in-depth analysis Prof. Ehud Heyman of current affairs by leading TAU scholars. The inaugural article is by Dean of the Iby and Aladar Fleischman Faculty of Engineering Prof. Ofra Bengio on rehabilitating Turkish-Israeli relations. Prof. Haim J. Wolfson Scientific investigation stirs our curiosity, while compassionate Dean of the Raymond and Beverly Sackler giving warms our hearts. This issue also presents a sampling of the Faculty of Exact Sciences Prof. Shlomo Biderman wonderful volunteer work of our faculty in social welfare, education, Dean of the Lester and Sally Entin the arts and medicine, activity that the entire TAU community can Faculty of Humanities be proud of. Prof. Hanoch Dagan Dean of the Buchmann Faculty of Law Prof. Yoel Kloog Dean of the George S. Wise Sincerely, Faculty of Life Sciences Prof. Asher Tishler Dean of the Faculty of Management—Leon Recanati Graduate School of Business Administration Prof. Yoseph Mekori Professor Zvi Galil Dean of the Sackler Faculty of Medicine Prof. Noah Lewin-Epstein TAU President Dean of the Gershon H. Gordon Faculty of Social Sciences Prof. Yoav Ariel Dean of Students Prof. David Menashri Dean for Special Programs Getting to that “Eureka!” moment of discovering new treatments for Alzheimer’s, cancer or heart disease requires many years of painstaking basic science in the university or hospital laboratory. Then come development costs that can reach $900 million per drug, clinical trials that can drag on Hundreds of senior scientists and graduate students at TAU work in for a decade, and a grueling drug-related research fields on cam- FDA approval process. But pus and at affiliated hospitals. Their common goal: to produce candidates for several TAU researchers, for drugs and therapies that are ready life-changing new drugs for pharmaceutical companies to de- based on their pioneering velop into working – and possibly By TAU Review staff life-saving – remedies. technologies now stand on the “About 20 recently licensed projects for drugs and medical devices verge of clinical success and are coming down the TAU pipeline,” commercialization. says Dr. Ze’ev Weinfeld, the CEO of Ramot, the university’s technology transfer company. “Tel Aviv University is a pow- erhouse in commercializing drug- related innovation, particularly for 2 We're coming up with novel the treatment of diseases and injuries thinking about the most of the central nervous system,” says stubborn medical problems. Weinfeld. In Alzheimer’s drugs alone, Ramot has licensed out six technolo- gies that are in various stages of de- velopment from pre-clinical testing to projects to the university’s broad Dr. Ronit Satchi- Fainaro and advanced clinical trials. Three of them cross-disciplinary research expertise. her team are are from the laboratory of Prof. Beka “We’re coming up with novel think- developing drugs that target Solomon, who was cited last year by ing about the most stubborn medi- malignant tumors. Scientific American as being one of the cal problems because our researchers top 50 innovators in the world. draw from knowledge in medicine, “We are confident and optimistic life sciences, exact sciences and engi- that out of these technologies we’ll see neering.” a drug on the market that will help Tel Aviv University is unique patients and their families combat among the world’s leading biomedi- this dreadful disease,” says Weinfeld. cal research centers, he says, because Prof. Zvi Galil, the TAU President, of this multidisciplinary approach. attributes the wealth of drug-related The university’s teams incorporate 3 practiced molecular and cell biolo- to currently have a drug in the fi- two companies are now engaged in gists, geneticists, biochemists and nal stage of clinical testing. The Phase III clinical trials on humans biophysicists, neuroscientists, psycho- Romanian-born neuro-immunologist which Solomon hopes will be com- biologists and computer scientists. is closing in on a treatment that will pleted in eight months. If efficacious, They are joined by physicians, sur- prevent the build-up of plaques in the and contingent on FDA approval, the geons and imaging experts at TAU- drug will be marketed inter- affiliated hospitals in the Tel Aviv nationally. metropolitan area that serve the larg- Prof. Solomon has been est patient population in Israel. working on a second ap- Biomedical research by TAU fac- proach for preventing ulty in recent years has led to the de- In Alzheimer's drugs alone, Alzheimer’s. She has devel- velopment, beyond the half-a-dozen we've licensed out six oped antibodies called BBS1 candidates for Alzheimer’s drugs, technologies that are in various that inhibit the formation of of potentially better treatments for the amyloid beta peptide to stages of development. schizophrenia, cancer, cardiovascu- begin with, so that harmful lar disease, burns and diabetes. The amyloid plaques can never following overview briefly describes brain. These accretions of toxic mate- form. The therapy could be admin- TAU breakthroughs that hold prom- rial, made up of amyloid beta pep- istered in the form of a vaccine that ise for business development, are cur- tides – snippets of protein – are the would prevent the disease altogether. rently being tested or have already hit hallmark of Alzheimer’s disease. The The BBS1 technology was recently the market. deposits form in the areas of the brain licensed to NasVax Ltd., an Israeli that control memory and cognition, company that works in the field of Q: leading to the deterioration of the sur- prophylactic vaccines and immuno- rounding cells and tissue, and the im- therapeutics. How to prevent pairment of those functions. damage to Once lodged there, the peptide Viruses R Us aggregates cannot be dissolved, re- brain function? sulting in Alzheimer’s – until now an Solomon is optimistic about her incurable, degenerative and terminal technologies that are mainly pre- Preventing Plaque disease that was first described by ventive in nature. At the same time, German psychiatrist Alois Alzheimer though, she is striding down another Prof.