Alzheimer’s breakthrough

Alongside an international team of scientists, UOW’s Professor Mark Wilson, has uncovered new understandings of the processes normally protecting our bodies from the debilitating disease which leads to a progressive decline of memory, rationality, social skills and physical functioning.

There are almost 280,000 Australians currently living with dementia - a term that encompasses a large group of illnesses which cause a progressive decline in a person’s functioning. Alzheimer’s disease is the most common form of dementia, accounting for between 50 – 70% of all dementia cases. Without a significant medical breakthrough, almost 1 million Australians are expected to be living with some form of dementia by 2050. But UOW researchers are on a mission to change that.

In a paper published in the prestigious Nature journal, Nature - Structural & Molecular Biology in December 2011, the Associate Dean of Science Research and his collaborators have for the first time measured, at the level of single molecules, how a chaperone molecule normally protects the brain from damage caused by a small protein known as Alzheimer’s beta peptide (Aß).

The focus of a number Illawarra Health and Medical Research Institute (IHMRI) groups is the study of protein aggregation and how this can cause disease, explains Professor Wilson.
“Proteins are the biological molecules that make up a lot of the structure of our bodies and the enzymes in our bodies are all proteins, so they are important things,” Professor Wilson said.

Proteins can be damaged or age and when they do they lose their normal shape, become sticky and stick to one another. These form lumps or aggregates which can cause problems – if you get lumps formed in your brain from Aß you will develop Alzheimer’s disease.”

The research published in Nature - Structural & Molecular Biology, was the first evidence to demonstrate the success of a state of the art new method to detect molecular interactions, single-molecule fluorescence (SMF). Being able to observe and characterise these crucially important molecular processes helps build a better understanding of Alzheimer’s, among many other diseases, and may one day lead to a cure.

“The way SMF technology analyses and reads the data is the really mind-blowing bit,” Professor Wilson said.

“There are some scientists at Cambridge and only a few people around the world who actually know how to do this – it uses quite advanced mathematics, but the actual acquisition of data is relatively straight forward and the manufacturers now provide software that allow you to manage this,” he said.

UOW is due to receive our own $1 million SMF suite of equipment, comprised of multiple lasers, a cutting-edge microscope and software, in May to continue this important research.
In the meantime, another UOW research group has had their own Alzheimer’s breakthrough.

Professor Brett Garner, Professor Aaron Oakley and Dr Heath Ecroyd have combined their different areas of research expertise in lipid (fat) biochemistry, molecular modelling and protein folding to show how a protein called apoD can directly “detoxify” oxidised forms of lipids that are present in cell membranes within the brain.

Professor Garner said the research had important implications for ageing and Alzheimer’s disease where free radicals are known to oxidize lipids and contribute to neuron death. Neurons are cells that process and transmit information.

“We have now identified a new pathway by which apoD may inhibit lipid oxidation in the Alzheimer’s disease brain. We will test the impact that changing apoD levels in neurons of genetically modified mice has on neuron stress and Alzheimer’s disease-like characteristics. Alzheimer’s disease prevalence is rising and there is no curative treatment. This may reveal new avenues to prevent or treat Alzheimer’s disease,” Professor Garner said.