WASHINGTON D.C., Dec. 17 – Congressman Chaka Fattah (D-PA-02), Congressional champion for neuroscience research, issues this statement saluting Mort Zuckerman for his $200 million gift to Columbia University for a new mind-brain institute. Fattah is author of the Fattah Neuroscience Initiative, enacted with bipartisan support a year ago to declare neuroscience research a national priority coordinated by the White House. He is Ranking Democrat on the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice, Science and Related Agencies, which oversees funding for much of government-sponsored research.

“The brain, its diseases and functioning, is in many respects the last frontier for medical research and treatment. Mort Zuckerman, a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School in my hometown, recognizes this imperative and has acted today in bold and generous fashion.

“Mr. Zuckerman is to be commended for his $200 million gift to Columbia University to endow the Mortimer B. Zuckerman Mind Brain Behavior Institute. This high-impact gift will surely keep on giving. It will inspire a roster of eminent scientists who will inevitably make strides in the causes and treatment brain diseases including Alzheimer’s and schizophrenia.

“In addition these great men and women will delve into how the brain actually works, how we learn and why we behave the way we do. Almost every family in our nation is touched by some form of brain related disease. All of us gain from knowledge of the brain’s workings. This gift benefits all Americans, and so we join to say: Thank you, Mort Zuckerman.”