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Brain Implants Relieve Alzheimer's Damage
Genetically engineered cells implanted in mice have cleared away toxic plaques associated with Alzheimer's disease. The animals were sickened with a human gene that caused them to develop, at an accelerated rate, the disease that robs millions of elderly people of their memories. After receiving the doctored cells, the brain-muddling plaques melted away. If this works in humans, old age could be a much happier time of life.
It's a fantastic time to be a mouse. Mouse with cancer? No problem. Mouse with alzheimers? No problem. Mouse with diabetes? Go ahead and have that Snicker bar, we have the cure for what ails ya.
I'm normally quite sarcastic when posting.
Not now. Alzheimer's Disease is one of the most horrifying maladies faced in societies where people live long enough to suffer from it.
I hope that this research pans out into practical treatment. Being betrayed by the body is terrible enough later in life.
Tags != Comments, and -1 (Troll) != -1 (I Would Respond Angrily To This Poster So They Must Be Trolling)
... for poor old Algernon. Good to see he'll remember his "smart" days.
I have something in common with Stephen Hawking...
My grandmother was involved in some secret trials of this technology. I have to say it is marvelous. For years she could hardly remeber a thing, but once we found a doner she can now remember everything up until the motorcylce accident.
For medical science. For when "positive thinking" doesn't quite do the trick.
I, for one, welcome our new elderly cyborg overlords...
Well, someone had to...
while being fully aware that they are dying. The frailness of age is still not solved with it, but it will make healthcare even more costly as all people getting older will demand this or other costly cures. One should wonder if people will demand longer careers (past their 70s) to pay for this extension of life too.
This space is intentionally staring blankly at you
He stops trying to run away from the guy in the lab coat.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neprilysin
Sigs are too short to say anything truly profound so read the above post instead.
Oh yes you do. Maybe not any more by the time you're almost completely gone. And also not when it all first starts (slowly). But in between there is a period when you're aware of what's happening and still lucid enough to understand. That phase is the true torture period for the person affected.
Linux user since early January 1992.
1.) Granted, I'm 34, so I'm not talking from experience, but from what I gather old age is already a happier time of life.
2.) If I'm interpreting the sentence correctly, the sentence is implying that most of the time when people reach old age they get Alzheimer's. If that is true, then I need a reality check because I didn't know that.
Yes, you do as it's a gradual disease. Before you've totally lost it, you'll be aware and often very depressed from it too. Not to mention how sad it is for the relatives to see someone's personality go away like this.
Beware: In C++, your friends can see your privates!
Where are they getting the brains to implant?!?
https://www.eff.org/https-everywhere
I feel strongly that your mind is the most important part of your body. Its truly what makes you unique,. This research progress is great news. I just wish there was some way to get my Father treatment. Someone once told me that one of the toughest time for a child is when he realizes his parents are mortal. Over the last couple of years I have had to watch a brilliant man slowly disintegrate into a shell of his former self (all the while knowing what was happening to him and that he really had no where to escape to). If you have a heart attack, you sometimes can do something about it, with better lifestyle eating etc. or even cancer, you can fight it with therapy and perhaps have the hope to be free of it. Not the case with this disease, and the worst part is that you know its happening to you as its slowly robs you and your loved ones of your last sanctuary, yourself. Dealing with this first hand has certainly had an effects on me and my outlook on life in ways that were not apparent to me at first. Any kind of progress against this disease simply makes my day.
I'd think that a stroke or other direct physical impediment must be far more frustrating for the actual sufferer.
Increasing Alzheimers is mostly a result of keeping people alive longer. No matter how age care progresses, there will always be a weakest link. The designed lifetime of the human body is being exceeded. Perhaps we should allow people to die earlier with dignity.
Engineering is the art of compromise.
One should wonder if people will demand longer careers (past their 70s) to pay for this extension of life too.
As socialized medicine seems just around the corner and the social security system is already in danger, I would go so far as to say longer careers should be strongly encouraged, and the social security age should be slowly raised. To pay for all of this we are going to need more cash going into the common government funds, and I don't fancy paying a 50% tax/S.S. rate to cover a bunch of Baby Boomers who retired at 60. As the infirmities of age are pushed back so should the accepted retirement age be pushed back. We already spend the first 20 years of our lives not contributing materially to society, I don't think we should also spend the last 20 years on an open ended vacation unless it can be paid for 100% out of pocket. While I think this is a wonderful medical advancement (there is a history of Alzheimer's in my family), it does in a way add to the impending problems the western world faces in it's growing elderly population.
We are all just people.
First off, here's the actual article, which was published in PLoS Medicine (meaning free access for everyone, yay).
Whether this accomplishment (and it is a pretty cool accomplishment) will be meaningful for people is very uncertain. First of all, Alzheimer's is not a positive diagnosis, that is you diagnose it by the absence of other explanations for observed behavior. So you don't actually have a way of confirming that the mental defects of a patient are *really* due to a-beta deposits. Unlike many diseases, we can't (yet) test blood or tissue or do imaging studies to confirm a-beta deposits (though there is tons of effort being spent on developing such tests). So you'd have to decide to do a pretty serious procedure on (generally) elderly people in less than ideal health on the basis of a flimsy diagnosis. It might well be worth it, but it is a big question.
Moreover, though, we don't really know what causes the neurodegeneration associated with amyloid diseases. We know that deposits or a-beta or tau tangles (or light-chain or huntingtin, or SOD or transthyretin (which was the topic of my thesis work) or whatever amyloidogenic protein you like) correlate well with neurodegeneration. But whether those are the cause or not is still a very open question. In fact there is plenty of research around that suggests that amyloid deposits themselves are not damaging, but the precursors in the aggregation pathway are the real culprits. Some have even suggested that amyloid is a more or less inert structure that can be used to segregate potentially dangerously unstable proteins away from the rest of the cell.
So, supposing this treatment does everything perfectly, chops up a-beta and disintegrates plaques, *and* we can deliver it to correctly diagnosed patients, we still might not even be hitting the right target.
Not to be too down on this topic, but we are still quite a long way from a treatment, much less a cure.
-Ted
-=-=- Quantum physics - the dreams stuff are made of.
My greatest fear in life is forgetting important things - forgetting what makes me wake up every morning, forgetting the good in people, forgetting those close to me. I know some old people for whom I'd gladly shed off years of my life if it meant they could touch more people the way they touched me. Alzheimer's has always been the one thing that I've prayed they could avoid. So, I ask you Slashdotters - do you know of any way I can help here? Can I donate money to this cause somehow? What can _I_ do?
Nice... hope the mods see you.
Peace sells, but who's buying?
roflroflrofl
First off, that's not exactly true, as a couple other commenters have indicated.
Secondly: it's not all about you. I said it's a terrible disease for society. That means not only the people who descend into grey terrors and death, but the loved ones who must bear with them through their suffering. People who will never suffer from Alzheimer's benefit from this research as well.
Tags != Comments, and -1 (Troll) != -1 (I Would Respond Angrily To This Poster So They Must Be Trolling)
What a Country!
Am I the only one who read "receive" instead of "relieve"?
To do list for Windows
3 Billion men alert vital and virile well into their 100's. That should be good for the planet.
Not that I would turn it down myself...
Help stamp out iliturcy.
Sometimes Alzheimer works as a coping mechanism. When they are in a nursing home, is it beneficial to there sanity to remember how yesterday was exactly the same as today? It helps them forget how miserable there life is and it makes every day as interesting as the last. They are always making new friends. They always have a "new" story to tell when someone comes to visit (even if they have heard it a million times). The visitors have someone that they can talk to because they won't remember it the next day anyways. It's like having a crazy old therapist!
Maybe we should consider all aspects before we go and play god. Do we really know what's best for the elderly?There's been a method for removing amyloid plaques from the brain since 2002. Elan Pharmaceuticals produced a vaccine which stimulated the immune system to produce antibodies against amyloid. Unfortunately, it's a cure, and cures are bad for business, so Elan abandoned it.
The frailness of age is still not solved with it, but it will make healthcare even more costly as all people getting older will demand this or other costly cures.
This is one piece of solving the frailness of age. Solve enough of them and "old age" is no longer frail.
Solve enough more and it is indistinguishable from healthy youth.
Which IS the idea after all.
Meanwhile, the cost of caring for an alzheimer's patient is astronomical. If you can do a one-shot procedure (even a very expensive one) which (at a minimum) arrests the progression of the damage and lets the victim continue independent living rather than being institutionalized under continuous skilled care, the overall cost of treating the disease will plummet.
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
But do people that have Alzheimer's actually want to know that they are dying? My Grandmother had it and I have to say it was terrible to watch it happening. Sure I would have loved for her not to have it but she did seem really happy though, for someone that was dying...
In the past, I've worked in group homes for those with developmental and other disabilities. Our clients had ailments ranging from muscular dystrophy, to Tourette's, to Down's Syndrome, to echolalia, to schizophrenia, to Alzheimer's, to a huge range of other things (typically a combination of some of the above). I worked with them 40 hours a week, day in and day out. My duties included the basic day to day care of these folks. Bathing them. Giving them showers. Dressing them. Cooking for them, or connecting their feeding tubes if they were unable to eat solid foods. Making sure they took their meds. And being there for them when they were confused or upset, and needed someone. To put a personal touch on my comments - my parents were basically too busy to care for me. and my grandmother essentially raised me. In recent years, she has had several small strokes, and is now dealing with Alzhiemer's. My experience is limited, I will admit that. But I have seen more than most. Alzhiemer's is a horrible condition. But I have never seen anyone feel depressed from it for more than a few hours at a time. Paranoid? Upset? Certainly. Confused? Almost always. Even hostile at times. But depression seems to be limited to very brief amounts of time... And once it passes, the people I've had contact with have never had any memories of feeling bad. I don't mean to belittle the feelings of those who suffer from what is, by all accounts, a horrible disease. But in all honesty, depression is something that seems to be much more common in those close to the people who are actually suffering the disease itself. Most people I have known who have had Alzhiemer's could be best described as ambivalent. Of course, your mileage my vary.
Damn it. Sorry for responding to myself. I just wanted to appologize for the wall of text. Too much time on other forums where I don't need to put in the line break tags has me slacking today
:(
I blame the 11 beers prior to my post, and my lack of the ability to use the preview button
Mod parent -1 sucks at formatting.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
My father in law was diagnosed 4 years ago with it. At the time he was still driving, but he was forgetting things, and shortly afterwards he lost the ability to speak coherently. Now he can't speak *at all*, he cannot feed or dress himself, he cannot walk, use the toilet, etc. However, he has flashes where he's quite obviously there - he'll call you over and point at your chin and then tap your nose etc. So he probably does know what situation he's in - he certainly did when it was diagnosed and in the stages leading up to his current condition. Massively degrading.
I have to say that that is one of the most naive comments I have ever read on Slashdot. I can only assume that you've never seen anyone degenerate due to Alzheimers. It is truly horrendous for the sufferer, and their loved ones. Read some of the experiences posted on this thread: it's an atrocious disease that turns once bright, sparkling people into senseless automata but what is so upsetting is the brief periods of absolute lucidity where, nine times out of ten, the sufferer just begs for help.
Alheimers is not a coping mechanism. Your little tale about "always having a new story" really is bordering on the offensive.
Oh, and how appropriate - the Captcha for this post is "declines". Sums the disease up nicely.
Alzheimers is associated with a lot of depression and also with a lot of really aggressive behavior for those reasons.
Neither of my grandmothers seemed depressed about it for long after they were diagnosed. But by then they'd started declining so rapidly, and lost so much of their memory, that they were essentially "gone" - their lives were reduced to five minute sliding windows of attention combined with some remnants of their long term memory, and they quickly lost that too.
Those weren't the horrible years for them. They five or so years before that were the bad ones, and we only realized how bad it was once we got the diagnosis and started thinking back to how they'd behaved over those preceding years.
But for both of them they were terrified for weeks or months around the time when their functional level got so low that they needed to be taken into care. My grandfather on my moms side had to struggle for a couple of months to get my grandmother to agree to even see a doctor when they both knew what was happening, and had to struggle for further weeks to get her admitted, as she kept refusing.
Why would you want to relive Alzheimer's damage?
Sick bastards.
Alzheimer's is not the nice, pleasant daily amnesia you think it is. Three times a week a take my mom to visit my step-dad at an Alzheimer's care facility. Many of the residents don't speak, some speak in non-nonsensical sentences and some mutter gibberish. A few of them seem "normal" for a minute or two until you realize they aren't "all there."
For some the effect isn't memory so much as panic and anxiety. Some get aggressive. These are kept in a medicated stupor. While it seems unfair to use drugs this way, I think it's better than the alternative.
TFA gives me a little hope because my mom is already on drugs to treat her dementia. She's OK now, but I'm always watching her closely and wondering when I'll be visiting her instead of taking her to visit.
Bigtime Consulting - "We're the best because we cost the most"
.... but I can't remember what I was going to say.
First up, I appreciate the responses giving by posters who have witnessed first hand the trauma of Alzheimer's sufferers.
I wonder if it would make any difference if very early on in life, a person became aware of what Alzheimer's was all about and resolved that if it should ever happen to them, they would calmly accept it. Then later on in life, if they began to experience the symptoms of memory loss, they would still have this memory of resolving to accept Alzheimer's if it should ever afflict them - and perhaps this memory would help them deal with the illness.
Deal with reality - the world as it is - rather than ideality - the world as you would like it to be.
another unfortunate thing about alzheimers is it could often :(
be misdiagnosed. Since we don't test for CJD in this country,
we will never know
I wonder if the occurence of Alzheimer's is lower in countries that
do test (like England).
Both diseases are awful, but it appears there is some relationship:
http://www.commondreams.org/views04/0107-07.htm
Dude, seriously!?
That's like saying that the upshot to AIDS is that you lose weight! Alzheimer's isn't like just being a little forgetful, where every day is some sort of new, fun adventure a la some Disney movie. Just taking the loss of memory aspect, try to imagine what it might be like to wake up in a room and not know where you are or how you got there. Or to be surrounded by total strangers who act like they're family. Or to forget who you are entirely. Knowing all the while that you used to remember these things and the next day you'll remember even less. That's like saying polio is a coping mechanism for a sprained ankle.
*tosses cookie to troll
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...are the de-plaqued mice now able to read the paper, recognize their grandchildren, and cook and clean after themselves? If not, what's the point?
My grandmother is currently in an assisted living environment but not for long. Her Alzheimer's has gotten much worse over the last couple of months. She definitely showed signs of depression more when she was in the early stages. She would frequently say things at holidays like "this will probably be my last ". I think the family chalked most of that up to her living alone and her friends "passing on" initially but in hind sight, I believe it was related to the Alzheimer's. This is such a cruel disease for both the individual and the family dealing with them.
Unfortunately, when applied to humans, the cure produces side effects like scurrying around the kitchen floor, a craving for cheese, and producing squeaks instead of intelligible speech.
That's what I thought this article was about at first. Oh well, I'll keep hoping.
How the heck does this work?
So they're implanting a gene that causes an enzyme to form that breaks down this plaque-like protein. These genes are implanted into skin cells, which are returned to the body (presumably to the skin), where according to the article, they don't move. So how does this affect the brain? It's not leukocytes or something else mobile. Is the enzyme released naturally into the blood stream? If so, is it possible to have some side-effects, too? The Wikipedia article says it attacks several different small proteins
I assume what they're saying here is that removing the patch of modified skin stops the treatment? So you can remove this kind of like you can remove a drug patch?
I don't have a clue what this is. Anybody know? An additional gene which eliminates the neprilysin gene in response to a chemical trigger? If the neprilysin-enhanced gene can "start to go wrong," how do they know this gene can't?
Ok, I'll finish with two more straightforward questions:
It sounds like this does not cure Alzheimers (reverse the damage, return brain function, etc), but would theoretically stop further damage, correct?
Would it be possible to simply synthesize neprilysin outside the body and inject it as a treatment?
If I ever needed a brain donor, I would want it to be you. I after all prefer my brains relatively new and unused!
I only look human.
My mother is a halfling and my dad is an ogre, so that makes me an Ogreling