The study was led by scientists at the University of Glasgow (UG) and the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST).
The research, published today in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA (PNAS), was co-led by Professor Eddy Liew from the UG's Institute of Infection, Immunity and Inflammation and Professor Nancy Ip of HKUST.
The study has discovered that a protein called IL-33 can reverse Alzheimer's disease like pathology and cognitive decline in mice.
Globally, 65 million people are projected to develop Alzheimer's by 2030.
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Professor Eddy Liew, Fellow of the Royal Society, who co- directed the research said, "Alzheimer's disease currently has an urgent unmet clinical need. We hope that our findings can eventually be translated into humans".
"IL-33 is a protein produced by various cell types in the body and is particularly abundant in the central nervous system (brain and spinal cord). We carried out experiments in a strain of mouse (APP/PS1) which develop progressive AD-like disease with ageing.
The hallmarks of Alzheimer's include the presence of extracellular amyloid plaque deposits and the formation of neurofibrillary tangles in the brain. During the course of the disease, 'plaques' and 'tangles' build up, leading to the loss of connections between nerve cells and eventually to nerve cell death and loss of brain tissue.
IL-33 appears to work by mobilising microglia (immune cells in the brain) to surround the amyloid plagues, take them up and digest them and reduces the number and size of the plaques. IL-33 does so by inducing an enzyme called neprilysin, which is known to degrade soluble amyloid.
Therefore IL-33 not only helps clear the amyloid plague already formed but also prevent the deposition of the plaques and tangles in the first place.
Professor Liew said, "The relevance of this finding to human Alzheimer's is at present unclear. But there are encouraging hints. For example, previous genetic studies have shown an association between IL-33 mutations and Alzheimer's disease in European and Chinese populations".
Furthermore, the brain of patients with Alzheimer's disease contains less IL-33 than the brain from non- Alzheimer's patients.
The paper, 'IL-33 ameliorates Alzheimer's disease like pathology and cognitive decline' is published today in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA (PNAS).
Alzheimer's disease is named after Dr Alois Alzheimer who first described it in 1902.