United States: According to the latest revelation, many people are facing changes that are consistent with Alzheimer’s, too, without any visible signs appearing as if their brains are more restrained to the condition.
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A group of scientists hailing from the Netherlands Institute for Neuroscience examined the samples of brain tissues that were stored at the Netherlands Brain Bank, a repository of brains donated by not less than 5,000 people who had lost their lives with a brain disease.
Out of the samples tested, a team of researchers found that only 12 of the brains had been cognitively healthy before their deaths while still having clear neurological symptoms of the disease’s underlying pathology.
According to Luuk de Vries, a neuroscientist from the Netherlands Institute for Neuroscience, “What is happening in these people at a molecular and cellular level wasn’t clear,” as sciencealert.com reported.
Vries added, “We, therefore, searched for donors with brain tissue abnormalities who did not show a cognitive decline in the Brain Bank.”
The findings of the research have been published in Acta Neuropathologica Communications.
Resilience cases have been noted before, as well
This kind of resilience has also been reported in other studies, and it is believed that both the genetic makeup one is born with and the other lifestyle practices one may have a role to play. These different factors are associated with the development of Alzheimer’s disease as a whole.
Through analyzing hundreds of different gene combinations expressed in the cognition-normal-Alzheimer’s brains, the Alzheimer’s brains of typical patients, and healthy controls with no sign of the disease, the researchers found that the resilient brains were different from the others with respect to the astrocytes cells that are involved in.
Moreover, the resilience shown by brains is best known for removing toxic proteins from those who have developed Alzheimer’s, which appears to have been working to auto-stop neurological garbage from building up.
De Vries added, “If we can find the molecular basis for resilience, then we have new starting points for the development of medication, which could activate processes related to resilience in Alzheimer’s patients,” as sciencealert.com reported.
Alzheimer’s is a major problem worldwide
Today, Alzheimer’s has been suffering more than 47 million people across the globe, which is yet to rise further.
According to the experts, it is not widely known what combination of factors are necessary for the degeneration to progress, and how to prevent the illness from growing further.
Therefore, the next step is to try to figure out the reasons for the difference in the production of processes of resilient brains.
De Vries stated, “It remains difficult to determine from human data which process initiates the disease process,” and, “You can only demonstrate this by changing something in cells or animal models and seeing what happens next. That is the first thing we have to do now.”