It is a small, filamentous protein, tau, which helps stabilize nerve cells in healthy brains, but can also clump together.
Some researchers suspect that these protein tangles are one of the main causes of Alzheimer’s, while others think they are a sign of other underlying brain damage.
A third theory among dementia researchers is that the tangles are a protective mechanism rather than a consequence of the disease.
Development followed closely
Because there is still so much uncertainty about the role of the proteins, they could also be key to understanding and treating the disease, if we can see exactly how they stick together in the lab. And the California researchers have now succeeded in doing just that.
They mimicked the brain’s natural signals in the lab with electricity of just under a volt, inducing uncontrolled entanglement of the core tau proteins.
This allowed them to monitor the transformation of healthy to potentially diseased brain cells in real time.
Researchers: ‘This can become an effective medicine’
One of the interesting findings was that the current created irreversible tangles when the proteins were exposed to 1 volt for a long time, which fits very well with the development of Alzheimer’s symptoms, which also progresses gradually.
And while there is still disagreement over the exact role of the proteins and the trial is far from covering all forms of the thread-like molecules, the researchers themselves think their technique could be used to quickly and efficiently test new drugs against the serious disease. and find out how we might be able to slow it down in the future.
“Because we can switch on and fine-tune the process at will, we can use this system to see which molecules could prevent or block specific stages of clumping,” said lead author Daniel E. Morse in a press release.