Neurodegenerative disorders, including Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, Huntington’s disease, and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), affect millions of people worldwide, yet their causes are only partly understood. Despite decades of research and billions of dollars of investment, we still lack effective therapies for most of these conditions.
In response, the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative launched the Neurodegeneration Challenge Network in 2018 — an effort to rethink how research in this field is approached. By bringing together scientists across disciplines, investing in high-risk/high-reward ideas, and building shared tools and resources, the NDCN has created a collaborative model that accelerates discovery and opens new paths toward treatments and cures.
We’re proud to share the NDCN Impact Report, which highlights the network’s progress over the past seven years. The report reflects advances across four core pillars of our approach:
- Driving science at the frontiers of the field by funding high-risk, high-reward projects.
- Expanding the field by recruiting new interdisciplinary talent into neurodegeneration research.
- Accelerating discovery through collaboration across labs, institutions and disciplines.
- Building community resources — from new tools and technologies to shared datasets — that empower the broader research community.
Already, discoveries from NDCN investigators are directly contributing to novel opportunities in biomarker development and uncovering new therapeutic pathways for both rare and common neurodegenerative diseases. These efforts contribute to CZI’s larger mission: to help cure, prevent, or manage all disease by the end of the century.