New stem cell platform can help predict Alzheimer’s
6 million Americans live with the disease
A first-of-its-kind stem cell platform developed by researchers at Brigham and Women’s Hospital can help to predict who will get Alzheimer’s disease, why they may have it and which treatments would work best.
“I’m really excited about this research because I think it will have an impact on families,” said Tracy Young-Pearse, associate chair of neuroscience research at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and one of the authors on the study published Wednesday in Neuron.
Young-Pearse and her team generated stem cell lines from 50 study participants who were tracked for decades and studied further after death.
The human stem cells were turned into brain cells and then living neurons could be analyzed in the lab.
Cell lines were created from people with Alzheimer’s and those who were cognitively normal as well.
“You can measure something in a dish and it tells you something about what happened in the brain of an 80-plus year-old person,” Young-Pearse told the Herald.
The unique cellular platform captured tons of precious genetic information. Researchers found specific forms of proteins associated with cognitive decline and Alzheimer’s and also uncovered pathways that influence the production of such toxic proteins.
Alzheimer’s is caused by plaque and tangles in the brain, and the rate of cognitive decline was correlated with the specific proteins the researchers found.
The cell platform, which Young-Pearse said she plans to share with scientists worldwide, can disentangle why someone may get Alzheimer’s and why someone else may not.
It can also predict the rate of cognitive decline in humans and be used to find out which treatments may work best in a particular patient.
“We are going to share that throughout the world so everyone can bring special expertise scientifically to address this very complicated problem,” Young-Pearse said.
More than six million Americans are living with Alzheimer’s disease and that figure is expected to rise to 13 million by 2050, according to the Alzheimer’s Association.
The disease kills more seniors than breast cancer and prostate cancer combined.
Young-Pearse said she became interested in the disease after first learning about it as a child.
“I couldn’t believe there was something that could take away your memories and make you forget your family members,” said Young-Pearse, who later became interested in science and jumped at the chance to work at Brigham and Women’s Hospital.
She said the new research generates a resource all scientists can use to study Alzheimer’s and hopefully solve the devastating disease.