Study could serve as guidepost for developing new therapies for Alzheimer s disease
In a major breakthrough, researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) have discovered how amyloid beta the neurotoxin believed to be at the root of Alzheimer s disease (AD) forms in axons and related structures that connect neurons in the brain, where it causes the most damage.
Their findings, published in
Cell Reports, could serve as a guidepost for developing new therapies to prevent the onset of this devastating neurological disease.
Among his many contributions to research on AD, Rudolph Tanzi, PhD, vice chair of Neurology and co-director of the McCance Center for Brain Health at MGH, led a team in 1986 that discovered the first Alzheimer s disease gene, known as APP, which provides instructions for making amyloid protein precursor (APP).
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BOSTON - In a major breakthrough, researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) have discovered how amyloid beta the neurotoxin believed to be at the root of Alzheimer s disease (AD) forms in axons and related structures that connect neurons in the brain, where it causes the most damage. Their findings, published in
Cell Reports, could serve as a guidepost for developing new therapies to prevent the onset of this devastating neurological disease.
Among his many contributions to research on AD, Rudolph Tanzi, PhD, vice chair of Neurology and co-director of the McCance Center for Brain Health at MGH, led a team in 1986 that discovered the first Alzheimer s disease gene, known as APP, which provides instructions for making amyloid protein precursor (APP). When this protein is cut (or cleaved) by enzymes first, beta secretase, followed by gamma secretase the byproduct is amyloid beta (sometimes shortened to Abeta). Large deposits of amyloid beta are believed to cause
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16 Feb 2021
In the brain, complex interactions between different cell types can drive inflammation and disease. This cross talk is hard to study in vitro, because culture systems are often too simple to recapitulate the intricacies of the brain, or the mix of cells is too poorly defined to give reliable results. In the February 8 Nature Neuroscience, researchers led by Lorenz Studer at the Sloan Kettering Institute for Cancer Research in New York City describe a triculture system of neurons, microglia, and astrocytes that combines pure populations of each cell type in a defined ratio. Generated from human pluripotent stem cells, each cell type can be genetically manipulated. Because the cells can be frozen in large quantities, the cultures can be readily scaled up as well.