Scientists have found an area of ​​the brain in which Alzheimer's disease originates

Unfortunately, despite a pretty decentthe level of development of modern medicine, there are still diseases that doctors are unable to cope with. One of these conditions is Alzheimer's disease - a serious illness characterized by a gradual memory impairment. The treatment of this disease is complicated by the fact that it is detected, as a rule, at rather late stages. But recently, a group of American doctors found a region of the brain in which this disease originates. And this will greatly facilitate the diagnosis.

The next step in the treatment of Alzheimer's disease

What is Alzheimer's

As you know, Alzheimer's is a diseasecharacterized by the accumulation of beta-amyloid protein in the brain. He, if you do not go deep into neurophysiological details, leads first to damage to neurons, and then to their death. This provokes a number of symptoms. As a rule, in the first stages there is a violation of short-term memory, for example, inability to recall something that happened recently. With the development of the disease, there is a loss of long-term memory, and then there are violations of speech and mental functions, a person loses the ability to navigate in the surrounding space, after which all body systems begin to degrade and ultimately a gradual loss of body functions leads to death.

Moreover, the detection of the disease at the very beginningthe birth of this process would be a real breakthrough in the treatment of Alzheimer's disease, because the earlier the disease is determined, the better the prognosis is in the treatment of this process. And it seems that a group of researchers from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) was able to find out where this disease originates. We often write about such discoveries on the pages of our website, so we recommend subscribing to our Telegram channel so as not to miss anything.

Comparison of a normal brain and a brain affected by a disease

In a series of experiments on laboratory miceit turned out that the accumulation of amyloid plaques begins in the mastoid body. Mastoid bodies are two small, rounded formations that lie at the base of the hypothalamus directly behind the pituitary gland in the brain.

Findings suggest that changes in the brainpeople with the development of Alzheimer's disease occur in a similar way, the authors say. Understanding the areas of origin of the pathological process will allow us to develop new therapeutic methods for both treating the disease and identifying it.

Moreover, on a simple assumption, scientists do notstopped and tested their hypotheses. It has long been known that the density of amyloid plaques is higher in those areas of the brain where the disease lasts longer. And, accordingly, plaques are much smaller in the recently affected parts of the central nervous system. Based on this assumption, as well as the fact that in laboratory mice the accumulation of amyloid began in the mastoid body, the scientists analyzed the tissues of the human brain. It turned out that in this area the amount of pathological protein is really extremely high.

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Now researchers hope to develop methodsdiagnosing and detecting Alzheimer's disease at an early stage, because now they, roughly speaking, “know where to look.” In parallel with “targeted diagnostics”, a hypothesis on the site of the origin of the disease in humans will be tested. And it will be possible to confirm the data.

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