Patricia Inacio, PhD,  science writer—

Factors known to increase risk for heart disease during middle age – diabetes, high blood pressure and smoking – also raise the risk of dementias such as Alzheimer’s disease later in life. So concludes a study presented at the American Stroke Association’s International Stroke Conference 2017, held Feb. 22-24, in Houston,…

Researchers have identified a new gene, called Rgs2 (Regulator of Protein Signaling 2), whose expression levels may be used in future diagnostic blood tests for early detection of Alzheimer’s disease (AD). It is the first time that this gene is implicated in AD. The study, “RGS2 expression predicts amyloid-β…

Researchers from Iran show in the first human trial that probiotics appear to improve brain cognition in humans. The study, “Effect of Probiotic Supplementation on Cognitive Function and Metabolic Status in Alzheimer’s Disease: A Randomized, Double-Blind and Controlled Trial,” was published in the open-access journal Frontiers in Aging Neuroscience.

Scientists have developed a novel form of vaccine targeting the two main proteins triggering Alzheimer’s disease, amyloid-beta and tau protein. Researchers and physicians have seen an increase in Alzheimer’s disease, with more than 7.5 million new cases diagnosed worldwide per year. There is an urgent but still unmet need for a vaccine and…

Neurotrope Bioscience’s lead Alzheimer’s drug candidate, bryostatin, promotes the formation of new synapses in the brains of mice, according to the study, “PKC epsilon Promotes Synaptogenesis through Membrane accumulation of the Postsynaptic Density Protein PSD-95,” recently published in the Journal of Biological Chemistry. Synaptogenesis and synaptic maturation are two…

The National Institute on Aging (NIA) and the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS), both part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), have launched the Molecular Mechanisms of the Vascular Etiology of Alzheimer’s Disease (M²OVE-AD) Consortium to better understand how the body’s vascular system, its network of large and…

In a new study titled “Identification of Vulnerable Cell Types in Major Brain Disorders Using Single Cell Transcriptomes and Expression Weighted Cell Type Enrichment,” researchers pinpointed microglia cells in the brain as the specific cell type that likely triggers not only Alzheimer’s disease, but also multiple sclerosis.

Researchers have discovered a network of nine genes that play a key role in Alzheimer’s disease onset. The study entitled “APOE*E2 allele delays age of onset in PSEN1 E280A Alzheimer’s disease” was published in the journal Molecular Psychiatry. Alzheimer’s disease age of onset varies greatly between individuals, a phenotype…

Amyloid plaques impair astrocyte function to regulate brain vessels’ blood flow in Alzheimer’s disease. These are the findings from a study entitled “Vascular amyloidosis impairs the gliovascular unit in a mouse model of Alzheimer’s disease,” published in the journal Brain. In this study, the researchers investigated the role of…

In a new study entitled “Critical Flicker Fusion Predicts Executive Function in Younger and Older Adults,” a team of researchers developed a new device that allows for a precise assessment of an individuals’ visual processing speed, i.e., how fast can a person can understand visual information. This device is a…