The decision of Count Giovanni Auletta Armenise to establish a foundation in the name of his uncle arose from his love for his wife, Dianora Bertacchini, who died from a brain tumor in 1994. Following a worldwide search for the best available treatment for her disease, he brought her to the Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School. During the course of her illness, they came to realize that the most sophisticated therapies currently available could not stay the inexorable advance of the disease. They understood that ignorance of the underlying chemistry and biology of cancer cells prevented the development of more effective treatment. Together they resolved to begin a foundation that would support research basic to medicine and agriculture. Count Giovanni Auletta Armenise chose to name the Foundation for his maternal uncle, Giovanni Armenise who was his mentor. Since 1996, the Giovanni Armenise-Harvard Foundation has established Armenise Centers for Cancer Biology, Structural Biology, Neuroscience, Microbial Pathogenesis and the Host Response, Integrative Biology and Physiology, Systems Biology, and Genomics and Post-Genomics at the Medical School, and supported collaborative programs between these Centers and Italian scientific institutions. The Foundation has also sponsored a series of international symposia that have brought together hundreds of American and Italian scientists to share their work and ideas.
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Biomedical centers at Harvard Medical School in Boston
