2009 - Another great year for research!

Through December 2008, our fund raising has generated nearly $620,000!  

We couldn't be more excited about the enthusiastic response the global scientific community has given to MPDs since the discovery of the JAK2 v617 mutation marker in 2005. This advancement has energized the research environment in ways we could not have foreseen just a few years ago.

After a call for grant proposals this year, we were pleasantly surprised to receive forty-three proposals for research from seven countries including the United Sates, France, Italy, Russia, The Netherlands, Israel and Czech Republic. These are exciting times and we have accomplished more in the past eight years than we ever anticipated accomplishing in several decades!

Decisions made in January, 2009 regarding these 43 proposals resulted in the funding of $1,800,000 in two-year research grants. Not only did we continue grant support for the MPD Research Alliance consisting of Gary Gilliland, PhD, MD (Harvard), Ronald Hoffman, MD (MT Sinai) and Ayalew Tefferi, MD (Mayo Clinic Rochester) but we expanded the Alliance to include Josef Prchal, M.D. (University of Utah).

We also added four New Investigator Awards including researchers in Paris, France, (Francois Delhommeau PhD) and Vienna, Austria, (Robert Kravolics, PhD.) Other new investigators are Benjamin Braun, MD, PhD, University of California at San Francisco, and Dorothy Sipkins, MD, PhD, University of Chicago.

As most of you know, we work in concert with the MPD Foundation (www.mpdfoundation.org) to leverage our funds and to optimize our results.  Having been able this year to expand the sheer number of researchers and the scope of the research being generated, we fully expect to achieve results over the next two years that will enhance our understanding of these disorders.

We are proud of all that you have helped us accomplish so far, and we continue to look forward to this ongoing effort. One day we will find the cure to these disorders.