Tau and Amyloid- β Synergize to Impair Neural Activity in Alzheimer ' s Disease

The mainstream of the Alzheimer's research community remains primarily interested in clearing deposits of amyloid-β from the aging brain. That said, there is a growing interest in tackling tau aggregation as well, particularly given the long years of failure to achieve meaningful results through clinical trials of immunotherapies that target amyloid-β. The current consensus on the development of the disease is that increased amyloid-β, leading to solid deposits of amyloid in and between cells, is an early phenomenon, and may in and of itself do little more than create mild cognitive impairment. However, amyloid-β aggregation sets the stage for the later production of neurofibrillary tangles, consisting of an altered form of tau protein, and these are far more harmful to brain function.

Both tau and amyloid-β protein aggregates are biochemically complex, with a surrounding halo of many varieties of harmful molecule. It is the halo rather than the deposits that do the damage to brain cells and their function, or so present thinking goes. Further, more recent research suggests that while tau is the more harmful of the two, tau synergizes with amyloid-β to causes greater damage than it would on its own.

This view of the condition may explain why attempting to intervene late in the process with anti-amyloid therapies fails to produce sizable benefits, but nonetheless does appear to help to some degree, particularly in animal models. So perhaps amyloid-β cleara...

Source: Fight Aging! - January 3, 2019 Category: Research Authors: Reason Tags: Medicine, Biotech, Research Source Type: blogs