Friday, February 3, 2012

Researchers Discover Crucial Finding About Progression of Alzheimer's

Alzheimer’s disease appears to progress like an infection, by the spread—from neuron to neuron—of a distorting protein known as tau.

Researchers working with genetically engineered mice independently at Columbia and Harvard found that destruction and death of brain cells, corrupted by tau, is spread from brain cell to brain cell. The finding answers a long puzzling question for Alzheimer’s researchers about how the disease progresses in the brain, incrementally destroying cognitive functions. And it holds out the promise that the disease could be halted in its early stages by the introduction of an antibody to tau. The report was in yesterday's New York Times and can be found here.

To read much more about Alzheimer’s see Psychiatric News here. And information about Alzheimer’s can also be found in The American Psychiatric Publishing Textbook of Geriatric Neuropsychiatry: Third Edition. Purchasing information is posted here.

(Image: Hywit Dimyadi/shutterstock.com)