Alzheimer's and Parkinson's to face a thud, a new drug making headway.

‘An elderly man, aged 70, reads about their love story to his elderly wife, everyday without fail. The wife, suffering from Alzheimer’s disease, doesn’t remember him and merely consider him as friend. He pins his hope each day that she would remember him and their children’: a scene from a famous movie ‘The Notebook’ pours my heart out for those elderly couple, who are facing this odd disease in real life.

I didn’t hear about this disease until year 2000, when I got to know from a classmate that her grandmother was living with a mysterious ailment (Alzheimer’s) where she kept forgetting things throughout the day. The disease had torn her grandmother badly, as she used to scream, shout and sometimes run away from the house. Really appalling!

Alzheimer’s, a neurodegenerative disease, is a condition of the brain that gradually destroys memory and thinking abilities of a person. Even, one can’t carry out the simplest routine tasks. People living with this ailment lose things easily, have poor judgment, and their mood and behaviour alter spontaneously.

Neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s, Parkinson's and Dementia are disorders of the Central Nervous System (CNS). It is believed that these diseases are caused due to the deposition of proteins, which can tear down the nerve cells. The damage extends to hippocampus, a vital part of the brain, assist in forming memories. With the rampant loss of neurons, the affected regions of the brain gradually reduce in size and die.

Primarily, the disease was first noticed by Dr. Alois Alzheimer in the year 1906, when he observed changes in the brain tissue of a woman, who had died of a strange mental sickness. She was supposed to have the symptoms like memory loss, language problems, impulsive behavior etc. Later, after her death, Dr. Alzheimer examined her brain and observed numerous abnormal clumps that are now described as amyloid plaques and tangled bunch of fibers (plaques, tangles, and the connection between neurons are considered as the foremost elements of Alzheimer’s disease).

According to a survey, approximately 44 million people are supposed to be living with Alzheimer’s disease and the figure is expected to rise to almost 76 million by the year 2030. It is believed that somewhere in the world, a fresh case of dementia happens every fourth second, which is a grave concern for our society especially for our elderly.

Keeping in mind the gravity of the disease, large numbers of neuroscientists from across the globe are trying to unravel the actual cause behind this mysterious mental illness and its treatment.

In a recent development, Scientists at the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München and the Max Planck Institute for Biophysical Chemistry in Göttingen, Germany, have successfully developed a drug that can considerably trim down the formation of such protein deposits in the brain. It is believed that the drug would prevent the formation of deadly oligomeric forms of proteins and in this manner, it would delay in the progression of neuronal damage, serving the brain to contain the disease-free state for a longer period of time.

Scientists believe that anle138b directly attacks the oligomer forms of protein and stops it’s proliferation in the brain.

For diseases like Parkinson's, where deposition of synuclein proteins in the brain causes severe neuronal damage, the new drug would help in preventing the formation of toxic oligomeric forms of protein in the brain. This brings the hope that Parkinson's and other neurodegenerative diseases may possibly be healed with anle138b.

With an aim to put an end to these diseases like Alzheimer’s, Parkinson's and others, a company MODAG GmbH, has intended to develop ‘anle138b’ up to its market maturity.

Adding another flag to the development, Scientists at the Max Planck Institute of Biochemistry in Munich-Martinsried, Germany along with their colleagues from the Technical University of Dresden, identify new mechanisms in the cellular stress response, also known as heat shock response that might prove a specific tool in terminating the neurodegenerative diseases in near future. They believe that heat shock response may possibly trim down the disease-specific cell damage.

According to them, different kinds of stress proteins are produced during heat shock response that digress the permanent damage to the life form. Almost 1500 such proteins play a vital role in heat shock response.

But still there are certain questions that perplex the mind of scientists such as why the additional brain regions in older people gets activated during cognitive tasks, why a few people remain healthy (cognitive) when they get older whereas others develop cerebral impairment, etc.

There can be other factors that might influence the health of elderly such as poor lifestyle, lack of exercise and physical activities or deprivation of social bonding.

Science and Society both of them can play a crucial role in changing the lives of the older people. Where Science can provide good quality of medication for various age-related diseases, society can lift their hopes to have a better life.

Courtesy: Max Planck Society
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