Harris Rosen donates $12 million to brain cancer research after death of his son

The owner of Rosen Hotels hopes to find a cure for brain cancer after suffering from the death of his own son.

"Adam was quite an extraordinary young man. Very athletic."

Harris Rosen proudly talks to Fox 35 about his son Adam, who was in charge of maintaining his hotels. But when Adam was diagnosed with brain cancer, life took a terrible turn for the Rosen family.

"The worst 2 ½ years of my life."

26-year-old Adam died back in November, something that hit his father extremely hard.

"I'm ok when I'm working. But I'm not ok when I'm home. I don't think I've had a good night sleep in a long time.My life will never be the same. But I can't just be this way."

So Rosen decided to make a difference by bringing the best scientists in the world together, from different hospitals and universities to find a cure.

Rosen tells Fox 35 it will be the very first summit of its kind, called the ReMission Alliance Against Brain Tumors.

"The remission summit is a collaborative effort demonstrating that working together is better than working with oneself."

He's also making a $12 million donation ($10 million from Rosen and $2 million from a friend) to the UF Center for Brain Tumor Therapy to get the research moving quicker.

"My hope is that others will hop on board and the goal is $100 million for this effort."

Dr. Duane Mitchell of the University of Florida says the donation will help accelerate the research.

"It is very expensive to develop test and evaluate new treatments."

But with more money and more experts coming together, their hope is to find a cure. 

"I think we will think of Adam and think how incredibly proud and happy he must be that we're doing something quite productive to find a cure for this horrible disease," said Rosen.

The summit takes place at Rosen Shingle Creek this weekend.