This article was truly fascinating to me on a personal level. I have a vested interest in this disease and more importantly in its cure due to a possible genetic predisposition that runs in my family and maybe even dormant in me. So, needless to say, I am intrigued.
The article specifically focuses on the formation of the senile plaques and the inflammatory events that are included therein. I supplemented my own understanding of the disease and insight into the article with www.alz.org. This was very helpful, particularly the pictures and interactive parts.
It is clear that the senile plaques are perhaps the most important thing for diagnosis and the destructive nature of the disease, but the article didn't really address another key pathology: the neurofibrillatory tangles. It is mentioned in the introduction, and in the summary, but the article fails to address this issue at all, really. My own investigation on a few good sites illuminated this a little for me. The tangles are torsions of a specific protein, called tau, that sort of "links" and "organizes" a track-like protein network used in nutrient and food-molecule delivery. The carefully organized system is like parallel rows of train tracks, and this twisted tau protein unaligns the rows and ends up in a loss of this vital network. This is a major component of the loss of the brain cells and tissue which causes the devastating disease.
Obviously the Beta-Amyloid plaques are a crucial element, and there is plenty of inflammatory involvement in this process of degradation, but there may also be a correlation to this other protein-linked event that is a primary factor.
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5 comments:
When I worked with alzheimers patients 11 years ago they did not have a test for disease. Do you know if they have found a way to test for alzheimers without cutting out the brain?
This is a totally unfamiliar area for me as I work exclusively in pediatric research. So, I have some terrifically basic questions about Alzheimer's. Are there behavioral, life-style or environmental components? One sees public service and other advertisements that rather imply that with continued intellectual stimulation one can avoid some of the loss of function that occurs with advancing age. I assume that there are differences between the devastation of ALZ and the somewhat expected deterioration due to advancing age. But, are there any behavioral, environmental or lifestype components that seem to be more associated with ALZ? Any that seem to be protective.
Wow that website was very cool! I like all the interactive parts you could go to and it was very easy website to follow. It also is helpful for those who have loved ones going through the disease to try and better understand the key aspects of this horrible disease.
University of Michigan is using a machine that originally is used to detect heart failure and cancer to diagnose alzheimers. The machine is called the PET (Positron Emission Tomography) scanner. Neurologists were able to show how they were able to tell alzheimers from a disorder called frontotemporal dementia by using the PET scanner. I encourage everyone to read this article. It's pretty interesting!
http://www.med.umich.edu/opm/newspage/2002/alzpet.htm
In response to StephenB7630, there are ongoing improvements in the treatment and also the diagnosis of this disease. Currently, there are great imaging techniques being used to "see" the senile plaques that avoid the dangerous invasive procedures that were necessary 11 years ago to definitively diagnose this disease. These tests, though, are very very expensive, as can be expected, and unfortunately are often skipped because of the reluctance for insurance to pay and the high costs. This was in fact the case for my own grandmother just a couple of years ago. Interesting to note, though, is that there has been a good amount of symptomatic diagnoses that were found to be incorrect after death and autopsy. For a great example of just one of the new tests being used, see acazares' post below and the link therein!
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