Breakthrough Research For Alzheimer’s Treatment: Targeting Neural Circuits

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This is a progressive disease that does not have any known cure as of this time. It’s characterized by a debilitating memory loss and cognitive functions.

Medical Express reports that there have been cases wherein the focus of treatment is on the “amyloid cascade hypothesis.” This suggests that the amyloid-ß (Aß) peptides are responsible for creating the plaques in the brain.

Creating Therapies For Alzheimer’s Disease By Targeting Neural Circuits

Alzheimer’s disease, the most prevalent type of dementia—and one for which there is no effective treatment or cure—causes a progressive and devastating loss of memory and cognition. Read more…

MIT reports that though it’s evident that there’s a connection between amyloid-ß and the condition, strategies aiming for the peptide has not successfully treated the cognitive impairment.

The paper from the journal, Nature, talks about the changes that contribute to elevated levels of  amyloid-ß. The researchers also discovered that these changes aren’t reversible.

Study finds a complex series of molecular, cellular, circuit and network-level changes

However, despite evidence of a link between amyloid-ß and Alzheimer’s disease, efforts to target the peptide have so far failed to reverse this cognitive decline. Read more…

Health Canal tells us about the treatments that were created to target amyloid-ß. These therapies use antibodies in an attempt to eliminate plaque from the brain. These are quite efficient. However, it was observed that this treatment fails because patients do not show any improvement in terms of cognitive abilities.

Li-Huei Tsai, the Picower Professor of Neuroscience and director of the Picower Institute for Learning and Memory at MIT, says that there is a disconnection somewhere because results are not as expected.

Therapies for Alzheimer’s disease

Many of the treatments designed to target amyloid-ß use antibodies to clear plaque from the brain, and are very effective in doing so, according to Li-Huei Tsai, the Picower Professor of Neuroscience and director of the Picower Institute for Learning and Memory at MIT. Read more…

There are more than 5 million Americans affected with the disease and in this case, there should be better programs for treatment in order to manage symptoms and halt progression.

Image Credit: Rebecca Canter

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