Corona blitz could offer hope on Alzheimer’s

MELBOURNE researchers may have opened a way to combat a build-up of plaque in the brain so Alzheimer’s disease can be treated with next-generation drugs.

For decades scientists have been striving to develop drugs capable of combating a build-up of a sticky plaque called amyloid in the brains of dementia patients, believed to be crucial to their deterioration.

Now a team from the ARC Centre of Excellence in Convergent Bio-Nano Science and Technology, at Monash University, have discovered a protective coating, or corona, that forms on the outside of the plaque, making it impenetrable to the medications.

The presence of that shield explains why drugs that are able to dissolve the amyloid in the laboratory have failed to have the same impact inside the human body.

The lead author, Tom Davis, said the discovery paved the way for shieldbusting drugs that would be able to reach and dissolve the amyloid, which also formed in the brains of sufferers of type 2 diabetes and Parkinson’s disease.

“It looks to be quite a significant coating, so we believe it could be to shield the amyloid from the human immune system,” Professor Davis said. “It could shield it from antibodies. It might just mean that we are taking the wrong strategy, and we need to take another path.”

The study, led by Monash PhD student Emily Pilkington in conjunction with the University of Warwick, found a corona formed on the amyloid.

For decades, it has been thought Alzheimer’s disease is caused by the build-up of a sticky beta-amyloid that forms brain cell-destroying plaques. But the inability to develop drugs capable of dissolving it has meant it has never been proved to be the cause of the condition.

Prof Davis hopes the study, published in the journal ACS Nano, will not only help establish whether amyloid is the cause of the disease but pave the way for overcoming it.