News

In another blow to hopes for an effective Alzheimer’s treatment, Merck announced that it is stopping its Phase 3 clinical study testing verubecestat (MK-8931) in patients with early stage disease. No specific reason was given, but lack of effectiveness in data compiled to date is a likely cause. The decision follows a…

The harmful tau protein associated with Alzheimer’s appears in one place in the brain, then spreads, rather than showing up in several places independently, new imaging techniques show. This finding suggests that preventing tau from spreading may be a good way of stopping the progression of the disease, a University…

CTD Holdings and the Kerwin Research Center are discussing working together on the use of cholesterol-lowering therapies called cyclodextrins as possible treatments for Alzheimer’s disease. Cyclodextrins are non-toxic compounds made up of sugar molecules that can bind with and extract cholesterol. Preclinical-trial studies in Niemann-Pick disease and Alzheimer’s show they can…

Three Phase 3 clinical studies have failed to reproduce previously reported benefits of adding investigational idalopirdine to a background therapy of cholinesterase inhibitors. The three randomized trials detected no improvements in cognition among mild to moderate Alzheimer’s disease patients treated this way. The study, “Effect of Idalopirdine as Adjunct…

The gut microbiome is increasingly seen as a key player in serious and chronic neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s — for reasons that are being suggested and explained, but not quite named. Now, researchers propose a term — “mapranosis” — to capture the process by which amyloid proteins produced…

Loss of synapses, or communication-conveying connections between one nerve cell and another, does not explain the early cognitive impairment in Alzheimer’s patients, researchers concluded. The study, “Moderate decline in select synaptic markers in the prefrontal cortex (BA9) of patients with Alzheimer’s disease at various cognitive stages,” appeared in the…

Takeda Pharmaceutical Company and Zinfandel Pharmaceuticals have brought an early end to a Phase 3 clinical trial after their Alzheimer’s therapy pioglitazone failed to prevent the development of mild cognitive impairment. The decision came less than a year after the partners completed enrollment in the TOMMORROW trial (NCT01931566). An interim analysis…

Canada’s IntelGenx has launched a Phase 2a proof-of-concept trial to explore whether the old asthma medication montelukast may be an option for treating Alzheimer’s disease. The idea that montelukast — also used to treat hay fever — may succeed where other approaches have failed, stems from research at Austria’s Paracelsus…

Salk Institute researchers have discovered how a therapy they are developing alleviates the symptoms of Alzheimer’s disease and reverses aging in mice. The compound, J147, does this by binding to a protein in mitochondria, the cells’ energy powerhouse, the La…

Washington University researchers have received a $10.3 million grant renewal to continue a long-term study of adults who are more susceptible to developing Alzheimer’s because their parents had it. The team is trying to define which of these adults is likely to develop the disease — and when — and to…