Verona scientist gets 2.5mn grant

(ANSA) - Verona, April 28 - Verona University researcher Gabriela Constantin is the recipient of a 2.5-million-euro European Research Council (ERC) grant for advanced research into into Alzheimer's disease, sources said Thursday.
    She will focus on understanding the role of white blood cells in the chronic and fatal neurodegenerative disease that has no known cure.
    This is the third such ERC grant Constantin has received in the past five years.
    In 2003, Constantin was the first woman in Italy to receive the Rita Levi Montalcini Prize for her studies of brain inflammatory diseases. The ERC named her an "outstanding female scientist" in 2010.
    Alzheimer's disease is the most common type of dementia and affects over 40 million people worldwide, one million of them in Italy. It is estimated it will affect 66 million by 2030, and 115 million by 2050.