Blog Posts

Changes in gene expression induced by paraquat and maneb implicated in risk for Parkinson's disease

7/2/2018

Ana Sandoiu reports in Medical News Today on her interview with Dr. Scott Ryan whose research is focused on investigating why some people develop Parkinson's disease while other do not," According to Dr. Ryan, "People with a predisposition for Parkinson's disease are more affected by these low-level exposures to agrochemicals and therefore more likely to develop the disease."

He and his colleagues used human cells to study the role of two pesticides, paraquat and maneb, in Parkinson's disease. They found that the levels of these toxic chemicals that impaired the cells in their model were below those deemed safe by the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) suggesting that the EPA's guidelines for paraquat and maneb should be re-evaluated.

Link to original story in Medical News Today

Link between Prior Head Injury and Parkinson's Disease Risk Gets Stronger

5/2/2018

ABC News is reporting on new research from Kristine Yaffe, MD, of the University of California, San Francisco, show that head injuries leading to a mild concussion or mild traumatic brain injury are associated with an increased risk of developing Parkinson's disease. This new data expands on that from previous research which has found between that moderate to severe traumatic brain injury are associated with an increased risk of developing Parkinson's disease.

We have always included questions about a patients history of head injury and loss of consciousness in our questionnaires designed to assess for associations between exposure to chemicals and age at onset of neurodegernative diseases such as Parkinson's. We believe that head injuries like chemical exposures can modify the subclinical course of neurodegenerative diseases to thereby alter age at onset of overt symptoms and therefore, must be considered in the differential diagnosis.

Link to story at ABC News

Documenting VOCs in the workplace just got easier with introduction of game changing smartphone technology

3/4/2018

The DailyMail is reporting on the release of a new smartphone from CAT that has an on-board air sensor made by the Sensirion. The new phone can detect Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs) commonly found in paints, solvents, carpets, furniture and cleaning products. This phone is a potential game changer for anyone at risk of occupational or environmental exposures to VOCs. The data these phones can detect could potentially be used in future research aimed at understanding the role of neurotoxic VOCs in age-related neurodegenerative diseases as well.

Link to original story in DailyMail

Link to CAT website

Could a diet high in L-serine stave of Alzheimer's disease till late in life?

2/19/2018

The WKU Herald is reporting a story about ethnobotanist Paul Alan Cox whose research looking at the Ogimi people of rural Japan, suggests that a diet high in the amino acid L-serine may provide neuroprotection and even delay Alzheimer’s disease onset until very late in life. According to Cox “If we dose early, we can push off Alzheimer’s until you’re 115 to 120 years old,” According to the article, the "standard Ogimi diet consists of various types of seaweed, tofu and pork, and is the highest diet ever measured in L-serine". So should you load up on L-serine? Not so fast, but you may want to follow the clinical trials that are underway at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center.

Link to original story on WKU Herald website.

Link to FDA website for clinical Trial

Cadmium exposure and Alzheimer's disease: could there be an association?

1/28/2018

An association between cadmium exposure and cognitive deficits in mice has been reported by Wang an colleagues. Exposure to cadmium was associated with impaired performance on hippocampus-dependent learning and memory tasks. An association between urinary cadmium levels and AD risk in human subjects has previously been reported by Peng and colleagues. Peng and colleagues suggested that toxicological studies were need to further elucidate their findings in humans. This new study in mice lends support to the hypothesis that there could be an interaction between these two factors shown to influence cognitive performance.

Link to Peng et al, 2017

Link to Wang et al, 2018

There are still no therapeutic interventions to prevent Alzheimer's

12/27/2017

An article by Denis Thompson of Daily Health News which appears this month on WebMd calls our attention to the unfortunate fact that despite the billions of dollars and years of time spent on research, medical science has still not discovered any way to prevent or stop the progression of Alzheimer's disease. Many genes and proteins have been implicated in the disease and yet none of these has been found to be a druggable target suitable for effective disease prevention. The good news is that exercise and lifestyle changes may at least help to slow disease progression and delay onset.

Link to story on WedMD

Smoking associated with an older age-at-onset of Parkinson's Disease

11/14/2017

The results of a new study by Gigante and colleagues (2017) published in the journal Parkinsonism & Related Disorders indicates that smoking is associated with an older in age-at-onset of motor signs in patients with Parkinson's disease. These new findings are consistent with our own also showing an older age at onset of PD among ever smokers (see Ratner et al. 2014). These data provide additional support for the hypothesis that exposure to chemicals can modify the progression of PD to influence age at onset of the disease.

Link to original article in PubMed

Estrogen provides neuroprotection from ALS

10/17/2017

Neurology Advisor is reporting on recent findings by Rooney and colleagues published in the journal Neurology which suggest that Hormone Replacement Therapy (HRT) provides protection against ALS. This large case control study investigated subjects from Ireland, Italy, and the Netherlands. It is important to recognize that the most common form of HRT currently in use contains conjugated equine estrogens. Animal models suggest that estradiol (E2) provides neuroprotection (Groeneveld et al., 2004). Future studies will be needed to ascertain if E2 provides greater neuroprotection than estrone (E1) in female human subjects.

Link to original story in Neurology Advisor

Link to citation in Pubmed

Treating Parkinson's with antioxidants early in disease process may slow disease progression

9/12/2017

Dr. Dimitri Krainc, the Aaron Montgomery Ward Professor and chair of neurology at Northwestern University and Dr. Lena Burbulla, a postdoctoral fellow in his laboratory, have shown that administration of antioxidants early in the disease process may break the degenerative cycle and improve neuronal function in Parkinson's disease. These authors identified a time-dependent pathological cascade in human neurons that begins with an increase in mitochondrial oxidative stress leading to accumulation of oxidized dopamine followed by lysosomal dysfunction and α-synuclein accumulation. This neuropathological toxic cascade was not observed in mouse model PD neurons. These results are consistent with my own research suggesting that compounds that increase oxidative stress have the potential to hasten disease progression resulting in a younger age at onset of disease. Most importantly, these observations point to an opportunity to slow subclinical disease onset through early changes in lifestyle such as avoiding exposure to toxic chemicals that increase oxidative stress.

Link to Original Story in Science Daily

Link to Article in Science

Did Glen Campbell's struggle with alcohol and drug abuse cause his Alzheimer’s disease?

8/17/2017

According to Glen Campbell's doctor Ronald Petersen in an interview with Today.com, saying alcohol or drug abuse caused Alzheimer’s disease is probably stretching it, "because it would mean that alcohol or drug usage actually leads to the development of plaques and tangles in the brain, and we clearly don’t know that". On the other hand, Petersen said, "severe alcohol use and certain drug behaviors can compromise the brain’s resilience. If we’ve had certain insults over our life — be it alcohol, drugs or head injuries — that may reduce the ability of the brain to compensate for the development of either aging or Alzheimer’s-type pathology. Other people who have not had those kinds insults might be able to compensate — their brains might be more plastic, more resilient — and stay functional at a higher level for a longer period."

Link to original story on Today.com

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