More than 40 international experts on Alzheimer’s disease participated at the "http://www.fundacioace.com/activitats-3/cientifiques/conferencia-barcelona-pittsburgh/" IX Biennial Conference Barcelona-Pittsburg, hosted in La Pedrera building in Barcelona from the 21st to the 23rd of May, to discuss the latest advances and the on-going clinical trials on this disease. Dr. Rafa Simó, head of the Diabetes and Metabolism group at Vall d’Hebron Institute of Research (VHIR), was the chairman of a session on new biological approaches and talked about type 2 diabetes as an accelerator for Alzheimer’s disease. Since the beginning of this year his group leads the European Project "http://www.vhir.org/salapremsa/noticies/noticies_detall.asp?Idioma=en&mv1=5&mv2=3&mh1=0&mh2=0&mh3=0&mh4=0&ms=0&any=2013&num=329" “Retinal neurodegeneration in type 2 diabetes as biomarker for Alzheimer’s disease”, funded by the European Foundation for the Study of Diabetes. The tissue of the eye’s retina is very similar to the brain, for that reason, VHIR researchers work with the hypothesis that the neurodegeneration progress advances simultaneously in both locations. In that sense, the project aims to detect early stages of Alzheimer’s disease with just an examination of the retina.At the conference, organized by the ACE Foundation and the Alzheimer Research Center at Pittsburgh University, were also presented the latest clinical trials that include passive immunotherapies based on antibodies, as well as active immunotherapies vaccines developed by Grifols through "http://www.araclon.com/?lang=en" Araclon Biotech.