About Us
Founded in 1944, the American Committee for the Weizmann Institute of Science develops philanthropic support for the Weizmann Institute in Israel, and advances its mission of science for the benefit of humanity.
REHOVOT, ISRAEL—May 27, 2021—The brain is often likened to a computer: neurons organized in complex circuits serving as its hardware; its software a plethora of codes that govern the neurons’ behavior.
May 27, 2021
To mark their 65th anniversary, Rosa and Harris Weinstein made a gift to Weizmann in honor of Dewey Stone, who brought Rosa’s family out of Vienna in 1939.
May 24, 2021
REHOVOT, ISRAEL—May 19, 2021—Our livers work hard to perform a significant range of activities: helping us digest food, maintaining body temperature, and serving as an important checkpoint of the immune system for everything that we eat. It is inside the liver that the unique, rich, and complex network of immune cells and pathways is set up to decide whether a food particle is harmless or a dangerous pathogen that should be neutralized and removed. The liver is, therefore, very sensitive to the food we consume, and sometimes a poor diet can induce a serious dysregulation of the immune activities within it.
May 19, 2021
The Weizmann Institute is made up of scientists and staff from many faiths and more than 50 nationalities. During the current crisis in Israel, the Weizmann Institute community offers a message of hope, unity, and coexistence. As Prof. Maya Schuldiner, Department of Molecular Genetics, says, “We know that the only way to move humanity forward is by working together.” Dr. Yifat Merbl, Department of Immunology, adds, “Just like in science, rather than focusing on the problem, we must start looking for the right solutions.”
May 19, 2021
REHOVOT, ISRAEL—May 18, 2021—A natural food supplement reduces anxiety in mice, according to a new Weizmann Institute of Science study. The plant-derived substance, beta-sitosterol, was found to produce the calming effect both on its own and in synergic combination with a common antidepressant, fluoxetine (brand name Prozac). If these findings, published in Cell Reports Medicine, are confirmed in clinical trials, they could point the way toward the use of beta-sitosterol as a treatment for relieving anxiety in humans.
May 18, 2021
This summer, after more than a year of pandemic shutdowns, we are more excited than ever to get outside. But we can’t let down our guard when it comes to sun exposure, which is the primary cause of the most common cancer in the world: skin cancer. In fact, the Skin Cancer Foundation says that over 85% of melanomas are linked to UV radiation, and having more than five sunburns doubles your risk of developing this deadliest form of skin cancer.
The American Committee’s Women for Science (W4S) initiative hosted an engaging webinar, featuring two leading neuroscientists: Weizmann Institute President Prof. Alon Chen and Prof. Michal Schwartz of the Department of Neurobiology. Following introductory remarks by W4S Co-Chair Ellen Merlo, Prof. Chen provided an overview Weizmann’s flagship Institute for Brian and Neural Sciences. Featured speaker Prof. Michal Schwartz then presented her trailblazing research, based on her groundbreaking discoveries about the connection between the immune system and the brain. Her innovative work is paving the way to a revolutionary platform for the treatment of Alzheimer’s and age-related dementia. To conclude the program, Prof. Schwartz participated in a dynamic Q&A, moderated by Ellen Merlo.
REHOVOT, ISRAEL—May 12, 2021—Severe symptoms of COVID-19, leading often to death, are thought to result from the patient’s own acute immune response rather than from damage inflicted directly by the virus. Intensive research efforts are therefore seeking to determine how the SARS-CoV-2 virus manages to mount an effective invasion while throwing the immune system off course. A new study, published in Nature, reveals a multipronged strategy that the virus employs to ensure its quick and efficient replication, while avoiding detection by the immune system. The study, conducted jointly by the research groups of Dr. Noam Stern-Ginossar at the Weizmann Institute of Science and Dr. Nir Paran and Dr. Tomer Israely of the Israel Institute for Biological, Chemical and Environmental Sciences, focused on understanding the molecular mechanisms at work during infection by SARS-CoV-2 at the cellular level.
May 12, 2021
COVID-19 is so dangerous because the virus uses a three-pronged attack mechanism to stop cells from quickly triggering the immune system, Israeli scientists have concluded.
They offer a portrait of how exactly the SARS-CoV-2 virus behaves once inside human cells — they say it’s the most detailed to date — in an article published on Wednesday in the peer-reviewed journal Nature.
After hundreds of hours in their labs monitoring the virus interacting with cells, they have concluded that the virus mounts a hostile takeover on the cell’s protein-making machinery, and stops it from making proteins needed to galvanize the immune system.
May 12, 2021
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