Brain growth factor might protect against Alzheimer's disease

摘要

Evidence from clinical trials suggests that a group of proteins called nerve growth factors can help partly reverse the cognitive decline associated with Alzheimer's disease, but studies demonstrating the ability of flbroblast growth factor-2 (FGF2)— a protein that shepherds the development of nerve cells—to protect against neurodegeneration have been contradictory. Tomomi Kiyota et al. (pp. 19469-19470) attempted to unravel the therapeutic effects of nerve growth factors against the disease. The authors tested the effect of gene therapy using a virus that transported the FGF2 gene into the hippocampus—a brain region implicated in memory—in mouse models of Alzheimer's disease. When engineered into the hippocampus of the mice before and after the onset of symptoms, the authors report, FGF2 helped reverse some of the memory and learning impairments observed in a water maze test. In the hippocampus, FGF2 reduced the formation of (3-amyloid proteins, which give rise to the plaques and tangles that riddle Alzheimer's-afflicted brains and erode cognitive ability.