The Burgess and Elizabeth Jamieson Chair in Healthspan Research

In 2008, the Burgess and Elizabeth Jamieson donated $2 million to endow a chair in Healthspan Research at the Linus Pauling Institute. A private investor and co-founder of the venture capital firms Institutional Venture Associates and Sigma Partners, Burgess Jamieson has followed the work of the Linus Pauling Institute for many years. The Jamiesons established the chair to help advance healthspan research, which focuses on helping people achieve long and healthy lives, maintaining vitality and health even as they age.

The Jamieson chair provides a strong foundation for the entire healthy aging program at the Linus Pauling Institute. The chair is intended to support a leading faculty member in the field and provide additional funds for research.

Tory Hagen

Tory Hagen, a biochemist and a principal investigator in the Linus Pauling Institute, became the inaugural holder of the new Burgess and Elizabeth Jamieson Chair in Healthspan Research in 2008.

Professor Hagen conducts studies into nutrients that have an impact on preventing disease and promoting health, particularly among the elderly. His research has uncovered two nutrients, lipoic acid and carnitine, which can improve memory, mobility, and overall function in aging animals and potentially in humans as well.

His research into the cellular mechanisms underlying the aging process has gained international recognition and earned two major grants from the National Institutes of Health: a $1 million grant to study dietary prevention of mitochondrial decay in the heart, and a $6 million grant, which Professor Hagen shares with institute colleagues Balz Frei and Joe Beckman, to investigate the ability of lipoic acid to lower the elderly's vulnerability to toxins.

Tory Hagen received his Ph.D. in biochemstiry from Emory University in Atlanta, and then served as a post doctoral fellow and research scientist at University of California, Berkeley. He joined the OSU faculty and the Linus Pauling Institute in 1998.