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In Marin / CONVERSATION
Eric Verdin
As the number of older Americans
begins to rise, the director and CEO
of the Buck Institute for Research
on Aging is leading his organization
on a mission to end the threat of
age-related disease.
BY KIRSTEN JONES NEFF
MAN Y OF US have seen it from the freeway — the striking white building sitting nobly atop the hills above Novato. We may be intrigued, and we
may even know that it is the Buck Institute for
Research on Aging. But like those captivated
by Willy Wonka’s mysterious factory, most
Marinites have never ventured inside and
cannot describe what is actually happening
within those architecturally stunning walls
(the center was designed by the late I. M. Pei).
It turns out a lot is happening inside the
Buck Institute these days. As it celebrates
its 20th anniversary, the Buck is a world-renowned leader in research on aging. The
institute’s mission to “end the threat of
age-related disease” has become increasingly relevant as our world population ages; a
2017 United Nations report predicts that by
2050 there will be more people 60 or older
on the planet than there are adolescents and
young adults ages 10 to 24, which will make
it important that societies cope with chronic
age-related disease. While the relevance
of the Buck Institute’s research spans the
globe, Director and CEO Eric Verdin, M.D.,
who arrived there from the UCSF Gladstone
Institute for Virology and Immunology three
years ago, is also working to increase that
work’s visibility and accessibility here in
Marin County. The 62-year-old Mill Valley
resident instigated a new approach that
includes outreach and efforts to connect Buck
Institute research to people’s daily lifestyle
and health choices.
We sat down with him to learn more about
the institute’s current research and his vision
for its future.
You took the helm three years ago. What is
your vision for the Buck Institute? We are
the only large independent medical research
institute in Marin and we have the potential
to change medicine. Today medicine is very
organ-centric. We call it “whack-a-mole”
medicine, treating every disease of aging as if
each were independent. You see a heart doctor, then a neurologist, and so on, and we are
currently treating these diseases as if they
were independent problems. Our message is
that all these diseases of aging are driven by
