Alzheimer's
Disease Video
Inside the Brain:
Unraveling the Mystery of Alzheimer's Disease
This 4-minute
captioned video shows the intricate mechanisms involved
in the progression
of Alzheimer's disease in the brain.
(November 5, 2015) A new study appearing in the Journal of Neuroinflammation suggests that the brain’s immune system could potentially be harnessed to help clear the amyloid plaques that are a hallmark of Alzheimer’s disease.
“This research confirms earlier observations that, when activated to fight inflammation, the brain’s immune system plays a role in the removal of amyloid beta,” said M. Kerry O’Banion, M.D., Ph.D., a professor in the University of Rochester Department of Neurobiology and Anatomy, the Del Monte Neuromedicine Institute, and the lead author of the study. “We have also demonstrated that the immune system can be manipulated in a manner that accelerates this process, potentially pointing to a new therapeutic approach to Alzheimer’s disease.”
“This research confirms earlier observations that, when activated to fight inflammation, the brain’s immune system plays a role in the removal of amyloid beta,” said M. Kerry O’Banion, M.D., Ph.D., a professor in the University of Rochester Department of Neurobiology and Anatomy, the Del Monte Neuromedicine Institute, and the lead author of the study. “We have also demonstrated that the immune system can be manipulated in a manner that accelerates this process, potentially pointing to a new therapeutic approach to Alzheimer’s disease.”
The findings are the culmination of years of investigation
that were triggered when O’Banion and his colleagues made a surprising
discovery while studying mouse models of Alzheimer’s disease. They observed that amyloid beta plaques –
which scientists believe play a major role in the disease – were being cleared
in animals with chronic brain inflammation.
At the time, the mechanism by which the plaques were being
removed was not clear. O’Banion and his
colleagues eventually set their sights on microglia, native cells that serve as
one the central nervous system’s first lines of defense against infection and
injury. Microglia are present throughout
the brain and spinal cord, are constantly monitoring their environment, and can
be switched on or activated to perform different functions such as control
inflammation, destroy pathogens, clean up the debris from dead or damaged
cells, and seal off the site of an injury.