IIT Guwahati finds new ways to prevent memory loss due to Alzheimer’s

Indian Institute of Technology Guwahati (IIT-G)  said its researchers have discovered new ways that can help prevent or reduce short-term memory losses associated with the Alzheimers disease. The research team explored new ways to prevent the accumulation of neurotoxic molecules in the brain that are associated with short-term memory loss due to Alzheimer’s disease. They reported some methods such as the application of low-voltage electric field and the use of ‘trojan peptides’ to arrest aggregation of neurotoxic molecules in the brain.

Key Points

• India has the 3rd highest number of Alzheimer’s in the world after China and US with 4 million patients and the current treatments alleviates only some of the symptoms with no disruptive therapeutic approach to treat the causes of Alzheimer’s.
• From 1998 to 2011 approximately 100 potential drugs for the treatment of Alzheimer’s have failed.
• The main reason for the memory loss in Alzheimer’s is the accumulation of amyloid beta peptides in the brain and the researchers are working on methods to reduce the accumulation of these to arrest the progression of Alzheimer’s.
• The researchers studied the neurochemical principles of Alzheimer’s and methods to prevent accumulation of neurotoxic molecules in the brain that causes short term memory loss.
• In 2019 they discovered that the external electric/magnetic field modulates the peptide molecule structure and prevents aggregation. The scientists of IIT Guwahati found that applying low voltage, safe electrical fields can reduce the formation and accumulation of toxic neurodegenerative molecules that causes short term memory loss.
• The research found that upon exposure to the electric field 17-35% of the degeneration of nerve cells are retarted which will delay the onset of the disease by 10 years.
• The research team found a possibility of using ‘Trojan peptides’ to arrest aggregation of these neurotic molecules the trojan peptides are designed by adopting an approach of deceit to reduce the aggregation of the amyloid peptide and arrest the formation of toxic fibrillar assemblies and reduces thee nerve cells poisoning which causes memory loss.
• The researchers mentioned that the animal models testing and clinical trials should be done before implementing this new therapeutic approaches into human treatment and the results of the research are published in journals like ACS Chemical Neuroscience, RSC Advances of Royal Society of Chemistry, BBA and Neuropeptides.

UPSC