Direct Link Found Between Toxic Alzheimer’s Protein and Memory Loss

the Psychiatry Advisor take:

New research indicates that beta-amyloid protein, a hallmark of Alzheimer’s disease and dementia, can cause memory loss even before physical signs of neurocognitive degeneration appear in the brain.

Lenzie Ford, PhD, of the University of Sussex, United Kingdom, and colleagues made the discovery by examining the effect of beta-amyloid protein inserted into the healthy brains of pond snails.  

While the protein is suspected of playing a key role in the progression of Alzheimer’s, not much is known about how the beta-amyloid plaques lead to memory loss.

The researchers performed a food-reward task on the snails. Following this, some of the snails were injected with beta-amyloid protein. When the task was repeated 24 hours later, the snails who had received the beta-amyloid showed significantly impaired memories, the researchers reported in the journal Scientific Reports.

“What we observed was that snail brains remained apparently healthy even after the application of the protein,” Ford said in a statement. “There was no loss of brain tissue, no signs of cell death, no changes in the normal behavior of the animals, and yet memory was lost.

“This shows that Alzheimer's amyloid proteins don't just affect memory by killing neurons of the brain, they seem to be targeting specific molecular pathways necessary for memories to be preserved,” she added.