The study is on the front page of the famous American journal Journal of neuroscience. For good reason, this is the first time that researchers have succeeded in using laboratory rats to prevent memory loss linked to Alzheimer’s disease thanks to gene therapy. The authors of this feat, scientists at the Institute of Neuroscience at the Autonomous University of Barcelona (UAB), explain how they managed to reverse memory loss “in these early stages” in mice.
Gene therapy uses nucleic acids (DNA or RNA) to cure or prevent disease. In the case of Alzheimer’s disease, Spanish researchers have used a gene that stimulates the production of a blocked protein in patients suffering from this pathology. The gene was injected into the hippocampus, a region of the brain involved in memory.
Alzheimer’s disease is in fact characterized by a dysfunction of the protein, “Crtc1”, responsible for activating the genes which code for the formation of long-term memory. “When the Crtc1 protein is altered, we cannot activate the genes responsible for the synapse or the connections between neurons in the hippocampus and the individual cannot perform their memory work properly”, explains Dr. Carlos Saura, responsible of the study, cited by UAB and taken up by AFP.
This study opens up great prospects for the treatment and prevention of this neurodegenerative disease. The next step is for the researchers to find out how to activate this protein in humans and see if the technique tested in mice is transposable in humans.