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| Science |
| Hope for people with Parkinson's after scientists eliminate disease in mice using treatment that generates new brain cells |
| 2020-06-26 |
| [Daily Mail, where America gets its news] A breakthrough that led to the creation of new neurons in mice could be used to transplant brain cells in Parkinson's patients and cure them of the disease. University of California San Diego School of Medicine researchers created neurons in mice using a new, much simpler method that involved rewriting genes. Parkinson's disease is characterised by a loss of dopaminergic neurons in a region of the brain responsible for reward and movement - replacing those cells could help to reduce or even reverse the symptoms of the degenerative disease. Xiang-Dong Fu and his team say their findings suggest certain brain cells called astrocytes can be turned into functional dopaminergic neurons. It is early in the research, but these newly produced brain cells could one day be implanted into a Parkinson's patient to help their condition. 'It's my dream to see this through to clinical trials, to test this approach as a treatment for Parkinson's disease, but also many other diseases where neurons are lost, such as Alzheimer's and Huntington's diseases and stroke,' The study published in Nature was conducted in isolated human cells and in mice. 'Researchers around the world have tried many ways to generate neurons in the lab, using stem cells and other means, so we can study them better, as well as to use them to replace lost neurons in neurodegenerative diseases,' said Dr Fu. 'The fact that we could produce so many neurons in such a relatively easy way came as a big surprise,' the lead author on the paper said. |
| Posted by:Skidmark |
| #1 Generating new brain cells is cool. Maybe we will finally have a cure for socialism. |
| Posted by: SteveS 2020-06-26 11:20 |