Heart drug may prevent, reverse Alzheimer’s Disease A new discovery spells hope for patients and families affected by Alzheimer’s disease.
A
research team led by Dr. S.R. Wayne Chen, PhD, has made an exciting breakthrough with the potential to prevent and reverse the effects of Alzheimer’s disease.
The CSM team discovered that limiting the open time of the ryanodine receptor, a channel which acts like a gateway to cells located in the heart and brain, reverses and prevents the progression of Alzheimer’s disease in animal models. They also identified a drug which limits the opening of this channel, interrupting the disease process. Dr. Chen’s team used a portion of an existing drug used for heart patients to treat mice models with Alzheimer’s symptoms. After one month of treatment, the memory loss and cognitive impairments in these models disappeared. “The effect was quite amazing,” says Chen, the Heart & Stroke Chair in Cardiovascular Research. “We couldn’t tell the drug-treated disease models and the healthy models apart.”
“The significance of identifying a clinically used drug that acts on a defined target to provide anti-Alzheimer’s disease benefits can’t be overstated”
Previous research has shown the progression of Alzheimer’s disease is driven by a vicious cycle involving a protein that makes neurons more active than usual. These neurons, in turn, produce more of the protein. However, it wasn’t clear why that happens, nor were there effective treatments to stop the cycle. “The significance of identifying a clinically used drug that acts on a defined target to provide
anti-Alzheimer’s disease benefits can’t be overstated,” says Chen, a member of CSM’s Libin Cardiovascular Institute and the Hotchkiss Brain Institute. Dr. Jinjing Yao, PhD, a student of Chen’s, is the first author of the study. This research – supported by philanthropic donations from the Alvin and Mona Libin Foundation, Canadian Pacific Railway Company and Sam and Beverley Mozell – is potentially highly impactful, as more than 500,000 Canadians live with Alzheimer’s disease and other dementias, suffering from memory loss and other cognitive impairments that negatively impact quality of live. The results of the groundbreaking study were published in the peer-reviewed journal, Cell Reports. While there are many steps to be taken before this finding could lead to a clinical trial, Chen is optimistic about the future of this research and its potential to improve the lives of patients living with Alzheimer’s around the world.
