Chinese scientist enters front lines of major issue in pro football

A neurobiologist from China will be the inaugural chair of a foundation named for a late pro football player who suffered from a brain disease associated with his playing days.

The University of California San Diego announced on March 8 that Yishi Jin will hold the Junior Seau Foundation Endowed Chair in Traumatic Brain Injury.

The foundation donated $250,000, which was matched as part of the UC San Diego Chancellor's Endowed Chair and Faculty Fellowship Challenge, as well as by the university's Division of Biological Sciences and the Kavli Institute for Brain and Mind, for total funding of $1 million.

Seau was a Hall of Fame linebacker, mostly for the NFL's San Diego Chargers, who took his own life in an incident that many connected to the concussions and subsequent depression he suffered from his 20-year football career.

Seau was given the nickname "Say-Ow" for the hard hits he delivered to opposing players. He also played for the Miami Dolphins and the New England Patriots before announcing his retirement in 2010.

On May 2, 2012, his girlfriend found him dead at age 43 with a gunshot wound to the chest in his hometown of Oceanside, California. He left no suicide note.

An autopsy revealed Seau had chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), a neurodegenerative disease associated with repeated blows to the head.

"What was found in Junior Seau's brain was cellular changes consistent with CTE," Dr Russell Lonser, who led a study while he was at the National Institutes of Health, told ABC News in 2013.

Patients with CTE, which can be diagnosed only after death, display symptoms "such as impulsivity, forgetfulness, depression [and] sometimes suicidal ideation", Lonser said.

The issue of head injuries is one that has vexed the NFL in recent years. The league adopted a disqualification penalty for targeting, one of several safety measures initiated in the last decade, for players who deliver intentional blows to another player's head or launch themselves in the air at a defenseless player.

The league agreed to a concussion-injury settlement estimated at $1 billion that finally was set in motion when the US Supreme Court rejected challenges in 2016.

The settlement awards up to $5 million for those with Lou Gehrig's disease; $4 million for past CTE deaths; and $3.5 million for advanced Alzheimer's.

Forty-two of 100 New England Patriots players who were members of the team's first three Super Bowl-winning teams have alleged in a class-action concussion suit against the NFL and football helmet maker Riddell that they have experienced symptoms of brain injuries, The Boston Globe reported.

Jin, who is currently a professor and chairperson of the neurobiology section in UCSD's Division of Biological Sciences, will focus on molecular genetic mechanisms underlying the development of the nervous system, and regeneration of wounded nervous systems, with the goal of better understanding human neurological disorders and brain injuries.

She is looking forwardto the added role.

"We have begun to explore opportunities to develop new strategies to help recovery from brain injury," she said in a statement. "This endowed fund will give us freedom to test high-risk and high-reward ideas.

"I am honored by this award and particularly grateful for the recognition of my work on the fundamental understanding of the genetic basis of cellular response to traumatic injury."

Jin has won several prestigious awards, including a Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers and a Jacob Javits Neuroscience Investigator Award.

She earned her bachelor's of science degree from Peking University and her PhD from the University of California Berkeley. She completed postdoctoral training at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

The foundation's gift also established the Junior Seau Lectureship Series to inform the community and K-12 students about the causes and risks associated with traumatic brain injury.

"I am passionate about engaging K-12 students in understanding scientific research," Jin said. "I am excited about being in the community to help raise the awareness of safety in youth sports."

The Associated Press contributed to this story.

Contact the writer at williamhennelly@chinadailyusa.com