Neuroscientists at Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine (USA) have discovered that a drug calledbexaroteno, used to treat cancer for a decade, is able to reverse the damage that occurs in the brain due to Alzheimer’s disease.
Alzheimer’s occurs in many cases when the body is unable to eliminate a naturally produced beta amyloid protein from the brain. In 2008, neuroscientist Gary Landreth discovered that the main cholesterol carrier in the brain, apolipoprotein E (ApoE), facilitates the destruction of beta-amyloid proteins. For this reason, and given that bexarotene works by stimulating the retinoid X receptors, Landreth and his team decided to test this drug to increase the levels of the protein in the brain and reduce beta amyloid plaques. The study was conducted in mice and the “surprising” thing, according to the authors, has been thespeed with which bexarotene improved memory and behavioral deficits, managing to reverse the disease itself.
Specifically, six hours after the administration of this drug,beta amyloid levels were reduced by 25 percent, and the effect lasted up to three days. An example of the behavioral improvement achieved would be the improvement of the nesting instinct typical of the rodents used in the study. When mice with Alzheimer’s found the right material to build in the nest – in this case, a tissue – they did nothing to create a space to nest, showing that they had lost this instinct. However, just 72 hours after starting the bexarotene treatment, the mice again used the paper to make nests. Likewise, the use of this drug also improved the mice’s ability to detect and respond to odors.
Seemsas if bexarotene reprogrammed brain immune cells to “eat” or engulf amyloid deposits, as Landreth and his team have enthusiastically explained, which for now allows reversing the pathological characteristics of the disease in mice. Now there is onlycheck if the effect is the same in humans.
