Type | Non-operating private foundation (IRS exemption status): 501(c)(3)[1] |
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Founded | 2002[2] |
Location | Los Angeles, New York & Princeton |
Focus | Huntington's disease research and drug development |
Method | Contract-based support of third-party research organizations[2] |
Formerly called | High Q Foundation |
Website | chdifoundation.org |
The CHDI Foundation, Inc., is a US non-profit biomedical foundation that aims to "rapidly discover and develop drugs that delay or slow treatments for Huntington's disease",[3] a neurodegenerative genetic disorder that affects muscle coordination and leads to cognitive decline.
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CHDI's predecessor, the High Q Foundation, was established In 2002 by a group of private donors.[2] Originally, the High Q foundation aimed to identify targets for treatments, while CHDI was a sister organization that focused on developing drugs to hit those targets.[2] CHDI now refers to the foundation as a whole.[4]
CHDI collaborates with a large number of academic and commercial research groups worldwide.[2][5] It operates through a "virtual" biotechnology model, funding third party research organizations as opposed to having a physical research infrastructure of its own.[6] Rather than supplying grants, CHDI enters into research contracts with its collaborators, and exerts a managerial role in addition to providing financial support.[2] In a 2007 Nature news feature, CHDI's then senior scientific advisor Allan Tobin stated, "Ninety-five per cent of science works on the principle that the best thing to do is to let good scientists follow their noses ... But this is a different attitude. We think we can direct the science."[2]
CHDI's annual spend is unknown, but it is the largest single funder of Huntington's disease research: according to a Nature news feature, it spent $60 million in 2006.[7] The identity of CHDI's donors is not public.[8]