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(Ivanhoe Newswire) -- A new drug that targets metals in the brain may reduce certain symptoms of Alzheimers Disease (AD).
Australian researchers recently administered the ionophore PBT2 to mice with Alzheimers Disease symptoms. Ionophores are molecules that transport ions like metals across cell membranes. The mice showed dramatic improvements in learning and memory within days, and the buildup of amyloid beta proteins in their brains was reduced within hours.
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Recent research suggested impairment of metals in brain, especially copper and zinc, contributes to the damaging buildup of amyloid beta protein. In previous studies, researchers showed the ionophore cliquinol (CQ) increased copper and zinc levels and decreased amyloid beta levels in the brain. However, further trials revealed CQ entered the brain in a limited amount. That is why researchers studied the effects of the similar molecule PBT2.
Demonstrating benefits of PBT2 treatment in the two separate models was both a stringency test, increasing confidence that PBT2 is more likely to show benefit in clinical trials, and also allowed us to determine whether specific forms of amyloid beta change in register with cognitive improvement in both strains, Ashley I. Bush, M.D., Ph.D., a senior scientist at the Mental Health Research Institute of Victoria and lead researcher, was quoted as saying. This is significant as cognitive loss in AD is not just a simple product of rising amyloid beta levels.
SOURCE: Neuron, 2008
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