Brett P. Lauring, MD, PhD
Associate Director
Clinical Pharmacology
Merck Research Labs
Dr. Lauring is currently an Assistant Professor in the Department of Pathology and the Taub Institute for Research on Alzheimer's Disease and the Aging Brain at Columbia University's College of Physicians and Surgeons. After graduating with a B.A. in Philosophy from Yale, he received his Ph.D. and M.D. degrees from the NYU School of Medicine in 1995 and 1996. His initial scientific interests involved intracellular protein trafficking and the biogenesis of intracellular organellar membranes and proteins. While a graduate student under the supervision of Drs. Gert Kreibich and David Sabatini, Dr. Lauring discovered that a cellular factor that associates with newly synthesized proteins and helps to ensure fidelity in intracellular protein targeting by preventing inappropriate binding of ribosomes to the ER membrane.
While a resident in Pathology at the New York Presbyterian Hospital, Dr. Lauring developed an interest in the molecular pathogenesis of Alzheimer's Disease, and in particular, the processing of the Amyloid Precursor Protein. Therefore, in 1998, during the final year of his residency, he undertook post-doctoral research training in the Department of Cellular Biochemistry & Biophysics at the Sloan-Kettering Institute in the laboratory of Dr. Martin Wiedmann. From his initial scientific interest in the biogenesis of integral membrane proteins, he became interested in the opposite problem, namely the mechanism by which gamma secretase initiates the removal from intracellular membranes of fragments of the Amyloid Precursor Protein. Accordingly, he is working to develop an in vitro system for gamma secretase processing of APP so that he can identify and purify novel proteins required for this reaction. While a fellow, he was awarded a Post-Doctoral Fellowship for Physicians from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute and a Pilot Research grant from the Alzheimer's Association to support this work.
In October 1999 Dr. Lauring moved to Columbia to set up a new laboratory and continues to work primarily on identifying novel proteins needed for processing of the Amyloid Precursor Protein.
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