BGRF announces the departure of prominent businessman and philanthropist Timur Artemev

LONDON - March 22, 2014 - PRLog -- The Biogerontology Research Foundation (BGRF), a UK-based charity founded in 2007 to the support of ageing research to address the challenges of a rapidly ageing population, ameliorate the suffering of the elderly and to reduce the impact of disease on future generations, announces the departure of the prominent businessman and philanthropist Timur Artemev.

“We would like to thank Mr Artemev for his contributions to the BGRF. His generous donations supported the work of Professor Zhenyu Ju of the Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences, Beijing, Professor Lenhard Rudolph of the University of Ulm and Professor Evgeny Nudler of New York University, as well as other projects in ageing research. Timur has confirmed his intent to continue to support ageing research in the future,” said Alex Zhavoronkov, PhD, Director of the BGRF.

Mr Artemev joined the trustee board of the BGRF in 2009 and actively participated in the organisation’s charitable activities, providing both support and guidance for several projects in biogerontology. As his farewell donation, Mr Artemev donated €6,500 to sponsor of the “International symposium on geroprotectors: practical applications of ageing research for drug discovery” forum, a part of MipTec 2014, Europe’s largest drug discovery conference in Basel, Switzerland, which runs September 23-24. The BGRF will help organise the symposium with a focus on ageing biomarkers, novel approaches to geroprotector screening and practical applications of ageing research.

The replacement trustee will be announced shortly. The current trustee team consists of David Chambers, MBA, LL.M; Joao Pedro Magalhaes, PhD and Alex Zhavoronkov, PhD.

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Notes to Editors

About the Biogerontology Research Foundation
The Biogerontology Research Foundation (Charity Commission for England and Wales registration number 1124054) seeks to fill a gap within the research community, whereby the current scientific understanding of the ageing process is not yet being sufficiently exploited to produce effective medical interventions. The BGRF will fund research which, building on the body of knowledge about how ageing happens, will develop biotechnological interventions to remediate the molecular and cellular deficits which accumulate with age and which underlie the ill-health of old age.

Addressing ageing damage at this most fundamental level will provide an important opportunity to produce the effective, lasting treatments for the diseases and disabilities of ageing, which are required to improve quality of life in the elderly. The BGRF seeks to use the entire scope of modern biotechnology to attack the changes that take place in the course of ageing, and to address not just the symptoms of age-related diseases but also the mechanisms of those diseases.