Animal experiments: vaccines may prevent Alzheimer's disease

  The human brain’s defenses against invading microorganisms can lead to Alzheimer’s disease, which suggests that vaccines can prevent this. It has always been thought that Alzheimer's disease is related to the accumulation of amyloid B in amyloid plaques in the brain, but the function of these plaques is still unclear. "Do they play a role in the brain, or do they pile up like trash?" asked Rudolf Tangi of Harvard Medical School in the United States.

  Now, Tanz has discovered that these plaques can be used as a defense system against invading pathogens. The team of Tanzi and Robert Moir of Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston discovered that amyloid B can act as an antibacterial compound and form part of the human immune system.

  B-In order to understand whether amyloid can help humans resist microbes that try to enter the brain, the research team worked with bacteria that can produce human-like plaque in the mouse brain. Was injected. Therefore, plaques can be formed directly.

  "Looking at these patches, you can see that each patch contains bacteria." Tanji said, "Bacteria can form complete patches overnight."

  This means that the infection is caused by plaque formation. These sticky plaques can block or kill bacteria, viruses and other pathogens, but if not removed immediately, they can cause inflammation, tangles other proteins, cause nerve cell death and cause Alzheimer's disease. Disease progression may accelerate. Therefore, the viscosity of light powdered protein has both advantages and disadvantages. Said Samuel Gandy of Mount Sinai Hospital in New Zealand.

  "This research is very important, showing that amyloid is related to infection," said Brian Walling of the Philadelphia School of Skeletal Diseases in Pennsylvania. His research shows that Chlamydia pneumoniae is a potential factor in inducing the formation of B-amyloid. Other studies may also induce sporozoite virus in the formation of B-amyloid. It shows. But so far, there has not been a good explanation for why such plaques form and how they accumulate.

  The Jacobus Jansen team of Maastricht University in the Netherlands found through MRI brain scans that early patients with Alzheimer's disease have a more transparent brain blood barrier. This shows that the disease is due to the fact that the brain is extremely vulnerable to pathogens. Jensen said: "The hypothesis of microbiology seems feasible." If infectious agents can prevent plaque formation, vaccines can affect disease groups. Moah said: "In other words, if vaccination can prevent these pathogens, it can prevent subsequent plaque formation."