This week's issue of Nature features two articles that point to ways in which the targeting of molecules associated with maintenance of cognitive function might one day help boost these functions in both normal and demented older adults.
Using chronic, low-level exposure to a pesticide, Timothy Greenamyre's group has produced a new in-vitro model that recapitulates significant aspects of the cellular damage thought to underly Parkinson's disease.
Open reading frame point mutations are associated with a variety of diseases, including Alzheimer’s, and many of these mutations destroy the function of the protein in question. But what of the expression level of the mutated gene? This question was addressed by Kenneth Kinzler...
It has been known for sometime that reduced intake of calories increases the lifespan of many species, including mammals, but just exactly how this works is unclear. Now work from Leonard Guarente’s lab at MIT suggests that <em>increased</em> respiration is what extends lifespan—at least in yeast....
In today’s Science, researchers from the Burnham Institute, La Jolla, California, report a new pathway that can cause neuronal apoptosis, or programmed cell death—the covalent modification of extracellular matrix metalloproteinases (MMPs)....
When it comes to food and the quality of life there is a growing wealth of knowledge that suggests “less is more.” This mantra is supported by a new study associating high caloric intake with increased risk for Alzheimer’s disease (AD)....
Research reported in the online Nature Medicine reinforces the potential of adult stem cells to repair the damaged or diseased brain, but it also points out the extent to which these cells are dependent on a healthy microenvironment.
In today’s issue of the journal Cell, researchers at Columbia University, New York, report they have figured out a way to coax ES cells into becoming motor neurons, opening up some exciting new possibilities for treating a variety of diseases...
Keith Crutcher reports on the World Alzheimer Congress in Stockholm. "From the relatively crude days of CT scans to the truly impressive detail now being offered by functional MRI, this revolution in imaging technology is making it possible to study the course of AD in ways previously unimaginable...."
Keith Crucher reports from the World Alzheimer Congress: In the symposium on amyloid-lowering strategies, Dennis Dickson presented a unique and clever approach to addressing the likelihood that macrophage-mediated clearance of amyloid will be an effective strategy in humans....