Jan. 13, 1:41 p.m.
The financial fraud of New York financier Bernie Madoff did not affect Penn's endowment, University spokeswoman Lori Doyle said - but that doesn't mean the University wasn't affected in other ways.
Last month, the Picower Foundation of Florida - which funded two Penn research projects - announced that it would cease all grantmaking because the foundation had lost its entire endowment with Madoff.
The discontinuation of funding from the foundation, located in Palm Beach, Fla., will affect Penn research projects on Parkinson's disease and diabetes.
Director of Penn's Center for Neurodegenerative Disease Research Virginia Lee had received more than $3 million over a five-year period from the Picower Foundation to fund drug discovery for Parkinson's disease.
Lee is now looking "desperately" for new funding from alternative sources to continue the project, she said.
"It was the funds from the Picower Foundation that enabled us to get started," she said. "It's not your typical hypothesis-driven science and therefore it's impossible to get funding from the NIH. That's why we were very fortunate to get this fund."
See Wednesday's Daily Pennsylvanian for more information.
