Breakthroughs

Solving humanity’s greatest challenges requires bold, visionary researchers who look beyond the traditional confines of science and medicine to create new possibilities. Karen Toffler Charitable Trust fuels the work of these pioneers through our future-focused framework — one that hinges on early-stage research, high-impact ideas, and cross-disciplinary problem-solving. Due to the nascent stages of their…

Toffler Scholar Adithya Gopinath’s research explores the connection between the brain and the peripheral immune system in people with Parkinson’s disease with the goal of developing a blood test to diagnose and monitor the disease and evaluate whether treatments are working. Learn more about his research in this article from University of Florida.

About 46.8 million people worldwide were living with dementia in 2015, and this number could double by 2035. Reliably differentiating between normal cognitive aging, mild cognitive impairment, and dementia requires significant clinical acumen from qualified specialists treating memory disorders, yet timely access to memory clinics is often limited for patients and families. Boston University Toffler…

UCLA Toffler Scholar Dr. Elizabeth Rose Mayeda was part of the team that presented research that begins to give us insight into why Alzheimer’s disease affects more women than men and why the disease seems to progress more quickly in women’s brains. Learn more about her research in this article from NPR.

Published Paper: Adithya Gopinath, et al. With support from The Karen Toffler Charitable Trust, University of Florida Toffler Scholar Adithya Gopinath was able to publish a paper in Nature about his research on Parkinson’s disease. Read the full paper to learn more about the exciting implications of their research in facilitating diagnosis and investigation of…

Cynthia Beard, Lara Yoon, and Catherine Psaras have earned the Toffler Scholar Award. These three students from the UCLA Fielding School of Public Health were chosen through a competitive submission process led by the epidemiology department. Learn more about these three students and their research in this article from UCLA.