Presentation of the Simone and Pierre Clerdent Foundation Prize to Colonster

On 15 December 2022, the Simone and Pierre Clerdent Foundation awarded its three-year prize of 400,000 euros at Colonster Castle. The prize consists of a research grant to support a medical research project in the field of human neurological diseases for three years.

The international jury awarded the prize in 2022 to Karelle Leroy, a teacher-researcher at ULB. Her research project focuses on understanding the mechanisms that lead to the formation of neurofibrillary degeneration, the neuronal lesion responsible for the symptoms of Alzheimer's disease.

The academic session for the awarding of the prize was held at Colonster Castle on 15 December 2022 in the presence of HRH Princess Astrid, who was welcomed by the Rector Anne-Sophie Nyssen (ULiège). Professors Gustave Moonen (ULiège), President of the Board of Directors of the Simone and Pierre Clerdent Foundation, and Jacques Brotchi (ULB), President of the scientific jury of the Foundation, Maître Didier Matray, Managing Director of the Foundation and Prof. Alban de Kerchove d'Exaerde (ULB), laureate of the Foundation's prize in 2019, spoke at the event.

Karelle Leroy

Karelle Leroy has a degree in applied medical biology and obtained her PhD thesis at ULB. During her thesis, she studied the role of a key enzyme, glycogen synthase kinase-3beta, in Alzheimer's disease and in cellular models. As a teacher-researcher at ULB, she teaches histology in the Faculty of Medicine and leads the research group "Alzheimer's disease and other Tauopathies", composed of five PhD researchers and two post-doctoral researchers.  Her research group is internationally recognised and has published 52 frequently cited scientific papers on Alzheimer's disease. Karelle Leroy's research activities have been rewarded with scientific awards such as the De Cooman Prize, the Van Buuren Prize and the Saucez Van Poucke Prize. 

Her current project focuses on understanding the mechanisms that lead to the formation of neurofibrillary degeneration, the neuronal lesion responsible for the symptoms of Alzheimer's disease. She is also working on pre-clinical trials in experimental models to interfere with the formation of these lesions.  There is currently no cure for Alzheimer's disease. The discovery of a treatment capable of stopping the lesions that affect the functioning of neurons is therefore of prime importance. One of the objectives of this research project is to study the effect of miRNAs, which are small RNA sequences regulating different genes and whose expression level is altered in Alzheimer's disease, on the formation of neuronal lesions in experimental models.

About the Simone and Pierre Clerdent Foundation

The late Count Pierre Clerdent created the Simone and Pierre Clerdent Foundation in his will. Upon his death on 10 June 2006, the bulk of his estate was bequeathed to the Foundation. Pierre Clerdent decided to create this Foundation to honour the memory of his wife, who had died a few years earlier of a neurological disease, and to advance medical research in this field.

In order to support medical research on human neurological diseases, the Foundation grants subsidies to research projects carried out by university teams in the French Community, and encourages the collaboration of these teams with others, in Belgium or abroad. The grants, amounting to 400,000 euros, are reserved for research projects lasting three years.

The Simone and Pierre Clerdent Foundation is chaired by Professor Gustave Moonen, Emeritus Professor of Neurology at University of Liège. Didier Matray, lawyer and former President of the Bar in Liege, is the Managing Director. The three-yearly prize is awarded by an international jury chaired by Professor Jacques Brotchi, Honorary Senator and founder of the Neurosurgery Department of the Erasmus Hospital in Brussels.

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Photos : ULiège © Michel Houet