Miami (USA), 10 Apr (EFE).-scientists from the University of South Florida (USF) have discovered that a protein linked to the development of Alzheimer’s disease appears to regulate its own production which could lead to new ways to prevent or treat the disease.
A team of researchers led by the Department of Psychiatry and Neurosciences and behavior of the USF in Tampa (Florida, USA)(UU.), has made this discovery in a fragment of a protein APP, according to a release from the USF today disclosed.
The scientist Demian Obregan, who led the study, said that for the first time “we have a direct proof that a portion of APP, called sAPP, acts as an essential mechanism of containment”.
The study has been published today in the online edition of Nature Communications.
It is estimated that 30 million people in the world suffer from the Alzheimer’s disease and of those 5 million are of United States, according to the USF.
With the aging of the so-called generation of the “baby boom”, those born between 1946 and 1964, expected the disease to increase dramatically in United States in the coming years.
Currently there are no drugs to prevent, reverse it or stop their development, only medicines that improve symptoms for a short period, according to the researchers. EFE
