Yet More Evidence for Impaired Drainage of Cerebrospinal Fluid in Aging

Leucadia Therapeutics is one of the young companies shepherded by the Methuselah Fund, in this case working on an Alzheimer's treatment predicated on a theory of the disease that views impaired drainage of cerebrospinal fluid as an important cause. Alzheimer's disease is a condition characterized by a build up of protein aggregates, and one of the ways in which the brain normally removes these aggregates is through drainage of cerebrospinal fluid out into the body. The passages for that drainage, like most other bodily systems, fail over time. An increasing amount of supporting evidence for this to contribute to age-related disease has emerged in recent years. In the example here, researchers arrive at the consideration of failing cerebrospinal fluid drainage from a quite different position, the study of hydrocephalus, or excess accumulation of cerebrospinal fluid in the brain. This is not uncommon in older individuals, and there is a noted overlap with Alzheimer's disease - it is not hard to join the dots between these two areas of research. Evidence for one tends to support the other, and the various research groups exploring the physiology of drainage in the brain may well wind up converging on the same destination. Syndromes of progressive neurological disturbances in the setting of normal cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) pressure have been termed as "normal pressure hydrocephalus" (NPH). Patients without known precipitating factors are diagnosed with idiopathic ...
Source: Fight Aging! - Category: Research Authors: Tags: Daily News Source Type: blogs