Archive for the ‘Healthy neurons’ Category
Alzheimer’s disease spreads from neuron to neuron via brain circuits
To learn how to stop the development of a disease should first know how it progresses. For this insanity, it is known that begins in an area of ??the brain called the entorhinal cortex, hippocampus and connected to the memory associated with it immediately. Also that is subsequently expanded to the rest of the brain. But you know what the process was to spread. Several studies suggested that the disease progressed to expand from one part to another of the brain, rather than migrating to the time in different areas, but there was insufficient evidence to prove it. In this work it is engaged.
Alzheimer’s is characterized by neuronal death and the presence of two aberrant structures in the brain: the proliferation of so-called senile plaques (deposits of beta-amyloid peptide) and the formation of structures called neurofibrillary tangles. The heads of the latter are modified Tau protein, one of the stars of the disease and therefore the study by a team of researchers from the faculty of medicine at Columbia University in New York. This protein is particularly important because their presence in different parts of the brain serves to monitor the evolution of the disease (the most widespread, is more advanced Alzheimer’s disease).
Was monitored for 22 months to mice genetically engineered to test the results
The researchers developed an animal model to describe the path followed the protein in the brain. It was known that the starting point of Tau was the entorhinal cortex, and that just by spreading throughout the brain, but what were the intermediate stages. They used mice genetically unable to generate the human protein altered in a very specific area of ??your brain: entorhinal cortex. It was pass the time and monitor the rodents to see the path being followed by Tau. If they found the protein in other brain parts, meant that expanded and which spread to other areas by contact. And so it happened.
Throughout 22 months was monitored in mice the tour of the protein. And it was found that as they aged, the protein was propagated from the entorhinal cortex, toward the hippo campus and, later, to the cerebral cortex. This ruled out the possibility of a spontaneous appearance of the protein throughout the brain.