A new drug treatment is able to stop the progression of the Alzheimer’s disease in the monkey brains. This was announced by research conducted by scientists from NYU Grossman School of Medicine in New York City. The drugs tested, CpG oligodeoxynucleotides (CpG ODN), induce immune defense cells to engulf the deformed proteins, beta amyloid plaques and tangles of tau, the accumulation of which kills neighboring brain cells causing debilitating disease. “The similarities in aging between the animals studied and our species give us hope that this therapy will also work in human patients,” said study author Henrieta Scholtzova of NYU Langone, reports the DailyMail.
Biogen, FDA ok for Alzheimer’s drug
In laboratory studies, older monkeys had up to 59% fewer beta-amyloid plaque deposits in their brains after CpG ODN treatment than untreated animals: the brains of treated animals had decreased tau levels. which can destroy nearby tissues when disease-related changes in its chemical structure cause it to attach to other cells. “Our results show that this therapy is an effective way of manipulating the immune system to slow neurodegeneration,” said study author Akash Patel, assistant researcher at the Center for Cognitive Neurology at NYU Langone Health.
Alzheimer’s, the first drug approved after 20 years: “Slows down the cognitive decline of the disease”
IMMUNE SYSTEM – Alzheimer’s disease is thought to be caused by the abnormal accumulation of proteins in and around brain cells, but it is not known exactly what causes this process to start. . The immune system is typically divided into two categories: “innate” and “adaptive”. The adaptive immune system intervenes after the innate immune system, which is the immediate response to a virus, or “first line of defense.” According to the researchers, a subset of immune cells in the innate immune system swallows and removes debris and toxins from body tissues along with invading microbes.
Previous studies have shown that these ‘immune keepers’ become sluggish as a person ages and fail to eliminate the toxins that cause neurodegeneration. Essentially, CpG ODN drugs are part of a class of innate immune regulators that accelerate these worn-out immune guardians.
Science & Health: ‘the microbiota, from Alzheimer’s to Covid’
I STUDY – In the course of the study the research team studied 15 female squirrel monkeys between the ages of 17 and 19, ideal subjects for the study of Alzheimer’s, since virtually all squirrel monkeys naturally develop a form of disease-like neurodegeneration as they age. Human. Eight of the monkeys received a single dose of the drug once a month for two years, while the rest were given saline. At the end of the period, the scientists compared the behavior of the two groups by comparing brain tissue and blood samples for plaque deposits, tau protein levels, and evidence of inflammation.
New treatment stops progression of Alzheimer’s disease in monkey brains @nyulangone https://t.co/gLoIlAttQz
— Medical Xpress (@medical_xpress) June 15, 2021
The drug would also bring cognitive benefits to the treated group of monkeys: subjected to a series of puzzles, the elderly monkeys who received the drug behaved similarly to young adult animals and much better than those of their age group. Not only that, the treatment would also lead to improvements in the animals’ abilities: the monkeys who took the drug were able to solve puzzles faster than their untreated peers.
A limitation of this study, however, is that the researchers only evaluated older monkeys that already showed significant signs of neurodegeneration. Only further tests on younger animals would allow them to evaluate the effectiveness of the treatment in the earlier stages of the disease. Now the research team plans to begin testing CpG ODN therapy on human patients with mild cognitive impairment or in the early stages of dementia and also intends to study this treatment in related neurodegenerative diseases.
below) // the var will be used by PaywallMeter to target the event on the correct pixel settings_testata.fbq_swg_promo = ‘556738118336305’; fbq (‘init’, header_settings.fbq_swg_promo); fbq (‘track’, ‘PageView’);
.