Surprise discovery allows scientists to block Alzheimer's

By Jeremy Laurance, Health Editor
The Independent, UK
Wednesday, 8 June 2011

Scientists developing treatments for the devastating brain disorder Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease (CJD) have unexpectedly blocked the onset of Alzheimer's disease, the most common cause of dementia.

Researchers said they were "thrilled" at the unexpected discovery that two antibodies – extensively studied in relation to CJD – may also have an affect on Alzheimer's disease. Almost 500,000 people a year in the UK and 20 million worldwide suffer from Alzheimer's.

The finding, published in Nature Communications, represents a "significant step forward in the battle to develop drugs to treat Alzheimer's disease," they say. The lead came from an American study by researchers at Yale University in 2009, which showed prion proteins causing CJD also play a role in Alzheimer's disease.

The finding triggered a race by scientists to discover whether antibodies being developed as a treatment for CJD might also work against Alzheimer's. Now a study on mice at the Medical Research Council Prion Unit at University College London has indicated the antibodies block the damaging effects of a toxic substance called "amyloid beta", a protein which accumulates and becomes attached to the nerve cells in the brain.

Over time, through its interaction with prion proteins, amyloid stops the nerve cells from communicating, causing memory loss, the distinctive symptom of Alzheimer's.

(More here.)