The brain's of Alzheimer's patients are characterised by abnormal accumulation of proteins called amyloid plaques, which many believe are responsible for the intellectual decline. Pritam Das and his colleagues from the Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville, Florida found that activating the brain's immune cells with Interleukin-6, a chemical that modifies the body's response to infection, removed these plaques from the brains of mice. The researchers were expecting the chemical to make the plaques worse.
"Our study highlights the notion that manipulating the brain's immune response could be translated into clinically tolerated regimens for the treatment of neurodegenerative diseases," said Pritam Das, co-author of the study, from the Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville, FL.
"This model is as close to human pathology as animal models get. These results give us an exciting lead to newer, more effective treatments of Alzheimer's disease," said Gerald Weissmann, M.D., Editor-in-Chief of The FASEB Journal. "This study demonstrates that investment in experimental biology is the best way to approach the challenge posed by an aging population to the cost of health care."
