A recent Lancet article assessed the impact of the French Alzheimer Plan (2008-2012). Government funding and coordination was provided by the Ministry of Health, the Alzheimer Foundation Plan and the French National Research Agency.
A bibliometric analysis, summarised in this article, raises interesting speculations on the relationship between public funding for dementia-related research and the resulting scientific productivity and innovation, as measured in terms of the ensuing quantity of high quality research publications.
Reference Devos, P. Haeffner-Cavaillon, N. [and] Ledoux, S. [et al] (2014). Assessing the French Alzheimer plan. Lancet. May 24th 2014, Vol.383(9931), pp.1805.
The first edition of the World Dementia Council Newsletter, available in six languages, has been published.
The World Dementia Council have also published their Statement of Purpose, explaining the councils aims and how they intend these to be achieved. The main thrust is to help deliver accurate and early diagnosis, more effective treatments and better care and support. The aim is to offer radical, independent advocacy and global leadership.
Both newsletter and statement of purpose are available at the links below:
Source: London: Department of Health / Dementia Challenge / World Dementia Council
A novel experiment to study the Huntingtin protein recently arrived at its orbital laboratory on the International Space Station along with 5,000 lbs of cargo delivered on board SpaceX’s Dragon capsule.
When mutated, the huntingtin protein causes Huntington’s disease, a hereditary illness that impairs muscle control and cognition. There is no cure for the disorder, which is typically diagnosed in mid-adult life.
To understand how proteins function, scientists often use a technique called X-ray crystallography, which allows them to peer at the molecular structure of the protein when it’s in a solid crystal form. So far, researchers haven ot had much luck creating crystals of the huntingtin protein on the ground, but crystals tend to grow more effectively in microgravity.
"On the ISS, we really hope to be able to finally get crystals that are big enough and perfect enough that we can solve the structure of the huntingtin protein," said Gwen Owens, designer of the study.
If the experiment works, the huntingtin crystals will be brought back to Earth this Autumn to be studied in an X-ray crystallography lab.
SpaceX, a private company based in Hawthorne, Calif., launched the Dragon resupply ship toward the International Space Station on Friday (April 18) from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida using its own Falcon 9 rocket. The mission was SpaceX’s third of 12 cargo delivery missions under a $1.6 billion contract with NASA.
Source: Huffington Post
Professor Philippe Amouyel outlines recent JPND progress in the latest edition of International Innovation magazine.
To access the individual article, click on the link below.
International Innovation Magazine
Click here, or on the link below to access other international press articles related to JPND.
For more information on International innovation magazine, click here.
A scientific team led by the Gladstone Institutes and UC San Francisco has discovered that a common form of a gene already associated with long life also improves learning and memory, a finding that could have implications for treating age-related diseases like Alzheimer’s.
The researchers found that people who carry a single copy of the KL-VS variant of the KLOTHO gene perform better on a wide variety of cognitive tests. When the researchers modeled the effects in mice, they found it strengthened the connections between neurons that make learning possible what is known as synaptic plasticity by increasing the action of a cell receptor critical to forming memories.
The discovery is a major step toward understanding how genes improve cognitive ability and could open a new route to treating diseases like Alzheimer’s. Researchers have long suspected that some people may be protected from the disease because of their greater cognitive capacity, or reserve. Since elevated levels of the klotho protein appear to improve cognition throughout the lifespan, raising klotho levels could build cognitive reserve as a bulwark against the disease.
"As the world’s population ages, cognitive frailty is our biggest biomedical challenge," said Dena Dubal, MD, PhD, assistant professor of neurology, the David A. Coulter Endowed Chair in Aging and Neurodegeneration at UCSF and lead author of the study,published May 8 in Cell Reports. "If we can understand how to enhance brain function, it would have a huge impact on people’s lives."
Klotho was discovered in 1997 and named after the Fate from Greek mythology who spins the thread of life. The investigators found that people who carry a single copy of the KL-VS variant of the KLOTHO gene, roughly 20 percent of the population, have more klotho protein in their blood than non-carriers. Besides increasing the secretion of klotho, the KL-VS variant may also change the action of the protein and is known to lessen age-related cardiovascular disease and promote longevity.
The team’s report is the first to link the KL-VS variant, or allele, to better cognition in humans, and buttresses these findings with genetic, electrophysiological, biochemical and behavioral experiments in mice. The researchers tested the associations between the allele and age-related human cognition in three separate studies involving more than 700 people without dementia between the ages of 52 and 85. Altogether, it took about three years to conduct the work.
"These surprising results pave a promising new avenue of research," said Roderick Corriveau, Ph.D., program director at NIH’s National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS). "Although preliminary, they suggest klotho could be used to bump up cognition for people suffering from dementia."
Having the KL-VS allele did not seem to protect people from age-related cognitive decline. But overall the effect was to boost cognition, so that the middle-aged study participants began their decline from a higher point.
Source: NIH, USA
Conditions which may accelerate the spread of Parkinson’s disease, and a potential means of enhancing naturally-occurring defences against neurodegenerative disorders, have been identified in two new studies.
Both sets of results have emerged from collaborations between the research groups led by Chris Dobson, Tuomas Knowles and Michele Vendruscolo at the University of Cambridge, who focus on understanding protein "misfolding" diseases. These include Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s diseases, as well as numerous others.
The first study provides evidence that the early spread of the protein aggregates associated with Parkinson’s appears to happen at an accelerated rate in mildly acidic conditions. This suggests that particular compartments within brain cells, which are slightly more acidic than others, may turn out to be appropriate targets for future treatments fighting the disease.
Meanwhile, researchers behind the second study appear to have identified a way in which the effectiveness of so-called molecular "chaperones", responsible for limiting the damage caused by misfolded proteins, can be significantly enhanced.
The papers appear in the latest issue of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Source: University of Cambridge
French research into the impact of a premature menopause (less than 40 years old) on cognitive function in later life indicates that premature surgical menopause and premature ovarian failure are associated with long-term negative effects on cognitive function.
These effects are not offset by menopausal hormone therapy (HT) completely.
The potential long-term effects on cognitive function should be included in the risk / benefit considerations for surgical menopause (ovariectomy) in younger women.
No significant link was discovered between premature menopause and the risk of dementia in later life.
The three Dementia Challenge Champion Groups have written brief reports detailing their progress during the past year.
These reports feature in aletter to the UK Prime Minister which also reiterates achievements since the Prime Ministers Dementia Challenge was launched 2 years ago and describes the Champion Groups ambitions for the third year of the dementia challenge.
To recap, the challenges three champion groups comprise:
The Dementia Health and Care Champion Group: co-chaired by: Sir Ian Carruthers (NHS South West) and Sarah Pickup (ADASS).
The Dementia Friendly Communities Champion Group: co-chaired by: Jeremy Hughes (Alzheimers Society) and Angela Rippon.
The Research Champion Group: led by the Ministerial Advisory Group on Dementia Research (MAGDR) and co-chaired by Dame Sally C. Davies and Professor Patrick Maxwell.
A glucagon-like peptide-1 agonist (GLP-1 agonist) medication, Exenatide, marketed as Byetta® and Bydureon® is used in the treatment of insulin resistance in patients with Type 2 diabetes.
Several recent discoveries have highlighted common cellular pathways that potentially relate neurodegenerative processes with abnormal mitochondrial function and abnormal glucose metabolism.
A follow-up study of patients with Parkinson’s disease (PD) who participated in an earlier "proof of concept" clinical trial using exenatide showed that improvements persisted twelve months after discontinuing exenatide therapy. These data provide strong encouragement for the further study of this drug in patients with PD, report researchers in theJournal of Parkinson’s Disease.
Earlier studies had shown that exenatide is neuroprotective and promotes functionally beneficial neuroplasticity in animal models of neurodegeneration. Furthermore, exenatide has a favorable safety profile, with only relatively mild gastrointestinal side effects (including nausea and weight loss) as frequent adverse events.
In an earlier "proof of concept" randomized controlled trial published in May 2013, participants were randomized to either self-administer exenatide in addition to their regular PD medications or to act as controls, i.e., receive their conventional PD treatment only. All of the participants had moderate severity PD. In total, 44 patients (20 in the exenatide group and 24 controls) completed the trial. After 12 months the results showed significant and clinically meaningful differences in both motor and cognitive symptoms between those patients receiving exenatide and the controls. At 14 months, when the patients had discontinued exenatide for two months, the exenatide-treated and control groups still differed from each other. The authors concluded that the study supported potential disease-modifying benefits of exenatide in PD, while acknowledging the lack of a placebo arm.
Source: Science Codex
Are patients with Parkinson’s disease „blind to blindsight?” That’s not a trick question, but the focus of an inquiry by neuroscientists from Rush University Medical Center as well as the Centre Hospitalier and University of Luxembourg.
Scientists have developed the concept of "blind to blindsight" to integrate data on visual impairments that contribute to the disability and diminished quality of life in patients with Parkinson’s disease.
Blindsight is observed in people who are blind as a result of a lesion in the visual cortex of their brain. Although these individuals are blind, they maintain the ability to sense accurately a light source or a rapid movement without being aware of it. Strangely, blindsighted patients even can respond appropriately to emotional facial expressions, especially those expressing fear or danger. It is believed that these visual stimuli can be turned directly into actions (e.g., movement of the eyes) by passing through lower areas of the brain. Thus, these retained visual functions operate as unconscious responses to visual stimulation even when there is extensive damage to the visual cortex.
Conversely, patients with Parkinson’s disease, who do not have a problem with their general vision, are unable to do these tasks: they display slowness and reduced accuracy of pursuit eye movements. They often have difficulties grasping a moving object, and show decreased sensitivity to low contrast and impaired ability to read "right away" other people’s facial expressions.
Taken together, these Parkinson’s disease symptoms represent major impairments in blindsight hence, "blind to blindsight."
The "blind to blindness" concept is described in theJune issue of the journal Brain by Dr. Nico J. Diederich, from Centre Hospitalier and University of Luxembourg, who is a visiting scholar at Rush University. He was joined by the Rush researchers Glenn Stebbins, PhD, and Dr. Christopher G. Goetz, and neuropsychologist Christine Schiltz, PhD, from the University of Luxembourg.
Based on this new concept, the researchers could now propose a new concept how to comprehensively understand within one visual systemblindsightnumerous visual signs and symptoms of patients with Parkinson’s disease. Impairment of the evolutionary old networks in the brain operating within the blindsight visual system form the basis of the visual problems in Parkinson’s disease.
