In partnership with SCOR, the French Alzheimer’s Research Foundation (Fondation Recherche Alzheimer) has created a Young European Researcher Prize. Worth EUR 10,000, this prize is designed to support and encourage promising research projects by young researchers.

By choosing Florence Clavaguera as the first winner of the Young European Researcher Prize, the jury has singled out a researcher who has conducted fundamental work on the spread of the tau protein in Alzheimer’s, which has opened up a whole new field of research into the disease. The Foundation and its Scientific Board are delighted to honor a French researcher working in a foreign hospital (University Hospital Basel, Switzerland).

Florence says: “In Alzheimer’s and many other neurodegenerative diseases, the tau proteins –very important for cell survival – group together and form insoluble clumps inside neurons, ultimately destroying them. In Alzheimer’s disease, the tau protein pathology has been shown to begin in a cerebral region and to spread over time, until it invades the entire brain. This spatiotemporal progression of tau clumps is very important from a physiopathological perspective, because it correlates with the clinical decline of patients. In our laboratory, we are studying the mechanisms behind the induction and propagation of the fibrillar tau protein pathology. We are trying to understand how the tau protein moves from a normal soluble state to an aggregate insoluble state and how this phenomenon escalates, with a view to stopping the spiral through therapeutic approaches.”

Publications from Florence Clavaguera

• Transmission and spreading of tauopathy in transgenic mouse brain
  Florence Clavaguera, Tristan Bolmont, R Anthony Crowther, Dorothee Abramowski, Stephan Frank, Alphonse Probst, Graham Fraser, Anna K Stalder, Martin Beibel, Matthias Staufenbiel, Mathias Jucker, Michel Goedert, Markus Tolnay
  Nat Cell Biol. 2009 Jul;11(7):909-13. doi: 10.1038/ncb1901. Epub 2009 Jun 7. PMID: 19503072
• Invited review: Prion-like transmission and spreading of tau pathology.
  Clavaguera F, Hench J, Goedert M, Tolnay M.
  Neuropathol Appl Neurobiol. 2015 Feb;41(1):47-58. doi: 10.1111/nan.12197. PMID: 25399729 Review.
• Co-expression of truncated and full-length tau induces severe neurotoxicity.
  Ozcelik S, Sprenger F, Skachokova Z, Fraser G, Abramowski D, Clavaguera F, Probst A, Frank S, Müller M, Staufenbiel M, Goedert M, Tolnay M, Winkler DT.
  Mol Psychiatry. 2016 Dec;21(12):1790-1798. doi: 10.1038/mp.2015.228. Epub 2016 Feb 2. PMID: 26830137
• Tauopathy models and human neuropathology: similarities and differences.
  Frank S, Clavaguera F, Tolnay M.
  Acta Neuropathol. 2008 Jan;115(1):39-53. doi: 10.1007/s00401-007-0291-9. Epub 2007 Sep 5. PMID: 17786456
• [Induction and spreading of tau pathology in a mouse model of Alzheimer's disease].
  Clavaguera F, Goedert M, Tolnay M.
  Med Sci (Paris). 2010 Feb;26(2):121-4. doi: 10.1051/medsci/2010262121. PMID: 20188034
• Rapamycin attenuates the progression of tau pathology in P301S tau transgenic mice.
  Ozcelik S, Fraser G, Castets P, Schaeffer V, Skachokova Z, Breu K, Clavaguera F, Sinnreich M, Kappos L, Goedert M, Tolnay M, Winkler DT.
  PLoS One. 2013 May 7;8(5):e62459. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0062459. Print 2013. PMID: 23667480
• Brain homogenates from human tauopathies induce tau inclusions in mouse brain.
  Clavaguera F, Akatsu H, Fraser G, Crowther RA, Frank S, Hench J, Probst A, Winkler DT, Reichwald J, Staufenbiel M, Ghetti B, Goedert M, Tolnay M.
  Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2013 Jun 4;110(23):9535-40. doi: 10.1073/pnas.1301175110. Epub 2013 May 20. PMID: 23690619
• Intercellular transfer of tau aggregates and spreading of tau pathology: Implications for therapeutic strategies
  Clavaguera F, Grueninger F, Tolnay M.
  Neuropharmacology. 2014 Jan;76 Pt A:9-15. doi: 10.1016/j.neuropharm.2013.08.037. Epub 2013 Sep 17. PMID: 24050961
• Peripheral administration of tau aggregates triggers intracerebral tauopathy in transgenic mice.
  Clavaguera F, Hench J, Lavenir I, Schweighauser G, Frank S, Goedert M, Tolnay M.
  Acta Neuropathol. 2014 Feb;127(2):299-301. doi: 10.1007/s00401-013-1231-5. Epub 2013 Dec 21. PMID: 24362441
• The Prion-Like Behavior of Assembled Tau in Transgenic Mice.
  Clavaguera F, Tolnay M, Goedert M.
  Cold Spring Harb Perspect Med. 2017 Oct 3;7(10):a024372. doi: 10.1101/cshperspect.a024372. PMID: 27940600

More publications from Florence Clavaguera are available on the National Library of Medicine website.