The Howard Foundation

On 25th February, a short ceremony was held in the Masters Lodge at Downing College Cambridge to award Foundation Fellowships to Julie Lambert and Jon Howard, daughter and son of the late Dr Alan Howard. The awards were made by the Master, Mr Alan Bookbinder, and given in recognition of their roles in the long standing support of the Howard Foundation to the college.

Julie and Jon join a small and distinguished group of existing Foundation Fellows – Humphrey Battcock, Kim Silverman, Alwyn Heong and Tadayoshi Tazaki. Julie is the first woman to hold the Fellowship. Jon had been a Wilkins Fellow at Downing College since 2007.

The Howard Foundation is the largest single source of philanthropic support to Downing College since the college was founded in 1800. Dr Alan Howard went up to Downing in 1948 to read Natural Sciences and gained his PhD in 1955. Alan and Jon Howard formed the Howard Foundation in 1982. It has since funded three major buildings at the college as well as many smaller projects.

Results from a study supported by the Howard Foundation are now published in the journal Clinical Nutrition. This study, the Cognitive impAiRmEnt Study (CARES), demonstrated improvements in working memory for cognitively healthy older adults, following supplementation with carotenoids, omega-3 fatty acids and vitamin E over a two year period.

The study was led by Dr Rebecca Power at the Nutrition Research Centre Ireland (NRCI), Waterford Institute of Technology (WIT).

Click here to see further information on the WIT website. Click here to see the paper itself on the Clinical Nutrition Journal website.

For over a decade, the Howard Foundation has supported research into the health benefits of the three macular carotenoids: Lutein, Zeaxanthin and Meso-zeaxanthin. This has led to a number of research trials and scientific papers published in many journals.

The most significant of these papers have now been gathered together on the Publications page of this website. This shows the story of the development of the research, first into eye health and latterly into eye and brain health.

On Tuesday 19 April 2022, Elina Mustonen will perform “Her Infinite Variety: Women of Shakespeare in Words and Music” a dramatic solo piece which brings Shakespeare’s text to life in combination with music from his age. The music is performed on the virginal, a popular instrument for home use in the age of Shakespeare. The Gramaphone magazine says “Elina Mustonen is a fine player, scrupulously attentive to the music and with nimble technique.” The concert, sponsored by the Howard Foundation, begins at 19.00.

Click here for details from the Cambridge Early Music website.

Preparations are well underway for the 2022 International Brain and Ocular Nutrition (BON) Conference to be held 27-29th July at Downing College, Cambridge, UK. Dr Alan Howard, together with Professor John Nolan and other scientists, founded the conference in 2018 following three earlier conferences on Macular Carotenoids in 2011, 2013, and 2015, all held at Downing College.

BON encourages participation by young scientists and has created the Early Investigator Society (EIS) to stimulate and reward any researcher who is a postgraduate student or has five years or less postdoctoral experience. Members of the BON EIS are encouraged to submits abstracts for presentation at the BON Conference. These are then considered for the Howard Foundation Travel Grant award, giving young researchers the opportunity to attend an international conference.

The awards for 2022 have been given to:

• In first place, Emmanuel Kofi Addo, Department of Ophthalmology, Moran Eye Center, University of Utah Health, Salt Lake City, UT, USA. The Lutein and Zeaxanthin in Pregnancy (L-ZIP) Trial – Initial Results – Prize €2000
• In second place, Hao Shi, Nutrition Research Centre Ireland (NRCI), Waterford Institute of Technology, Ireland. The Development of Lutein-enriched Yoghurt to improve Human Health – Prize €1500
• In third place, Mickeal N. Key, Decision Neuroscience Laboratory, University of Illinois, Urbana, IL. USA. Gene-Environment Interactions in Aging: The Moderating Effect of ApoE Genotype on the Relationship Between Nutrition, Functional Brain Organization, and Cognitive Function – Prize €1300

For further information please visit www.bonconference.org

Thursday 2nd December 2021 from 6pm to 8.15pm.

The Royal Society of Medicine, together with the Howard Foundation, presented a lecture in memory of Dr Alan Howard at the Royal Society of Medicine, 1 Wimpole St, Marylebone, London, W1G 0AE on Thursday 2nd December. The event opened at 6pm with the lecture itself starting at 6.30. Following the lecture, there was a panel discussion and Q&A session, ending at 7.30. Guests then networked, relaxed, and enjoyed a refreshing drink in the RSM’s iconic glass atrium. The event ended at 8.15pm.

The event was chaired by Professor Sir John Cunningham – the Queen’s physician. Mr Jon Howard from the Howard Foundation gave a brief outline of the life of Dr Alan Howard.

The main lecture was given by Professor Sir Stephen O’Rahilly, Professor of Clinical Biochemistry and Medicine, Director, MRC Metabolic Diseases Unit, Wellcome-MRC Institute of Metabolic Science, University of Cambridge, UK. The title was Celebrating the centenary of insulin. The lecture reflected on the advances in our understanding of the hormonal control of metabolism and energy balance that has occurred over the past century, and how these advancements have led to improvements in the diagnosis and therapy of metabolic disease.

Mr Chris Askew, CEO, Diabetes UK, also gave a short talk on current patient perspectives and the important work of Diabetes UK. 

This was held in Downing College Chapel, Cambridge UK, on Saturday 23 October 2021 starting at 12 noon.

A seven minute montage of photographs from the life of Dr Howard is shown before the service begins. After the service has ended, a short video is shown using the traditional Irish farewell song A Parting Glass.

Filming and live stream provided by WaveFX, Cambridge.

The 2021 International Brain and Ocular Nutrition (BON) Conference was held online on the 8th September. It was hosted by the Nutrition Research Centre Ireland (NRCI) and chaired by Professor George Perry – Editor-in-Chief Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease.

There were three presentations:

Research Background and Rationale by Professor Ríona Mulcahy of the University Hospital, Waterford.

Results from the CARES project by Dr Rebecca Power of the NRCI,
which discussed targeted nutritional supplementation for both healthy older adults and patients with mild cognitive impairment.

Results from the reMIND project by Professor John Nolan, Director of the NRCI,
which discussed targeted nutritional supplementation for patients with Alzheimer’s disease.

Both the CARES and reMIND projects were funded by the Howard Foundation.

The presentations are available for viewing to members of the BON Conference.

The Irish Times and the Irish Examiner carried reports from the presentations. Click on the image of each report to read it on the newspaper website.

In 2009, Dr Alan Howard met John Nolan, then a PhD scientist, at a conference in Florida. Over the next 11 years, Dr Howard and Professor Nolan, as he is now, conducted significant research into eye and brain health. 

On Friday 10th September at 15.30 in Ireland, Professor Nolan, Howard Chair in Human Nutrition at WIT and the founder/director of the Nutrition Research Centre Ireland, presented the inaugural Alan Howard Memorial Lecture at the Waterford Institute of Technology.

The Waterford Institute of Technology have announced that this will be the start of an annual series of lectures, given by invited speakers, in memory of Dr Howard who was awarded an WIT Honorary Fellowship in 2019.

For a review of the events relating to Dr Howards contributions to the work at the Nutrition Research Centre Ireland, read the interview with Dr Howard from 2018.

Research Features is an online service bringing information on current research topics to a general audience. It has recently published an article by Professor John Nolan, the Howard Chair in Human Nutrition and Rebecca Power, a Howard Research Fellow, both at the Nutrition Research Centre Ireland (NRCI) which is part of the Waterford Institute of Technology.

The article The power of diet in protecting the ageing brain summarises both current and ongoing research into how nutrition supports brain health. It states that “It is thought that around a third of Alzheimer’s cases could be avoided if lifestyle changes are implemented“.

Click here to read the paper on the Research Features website from which a PDF copy can be downloaded.

Today, the Intellectual Property Office of Ireland approved the application by Howard Foundation Holdings of a patent for “Prevention and/or treatment of neurodegenerative disease”. The inventors are the late Dr Alan Howard, Professor John Nolan of the Nutrition Research Centre Ireland and Dr Riona Mulcahy of the University Hospital, Waterford.

This follows the granting of the patent in the UK in November 2019 and in the USA in November 2020.