SYMPTOMS of Alzheimer’s disease in mice have been eased by extra supplies of “heat shock” proteins, which re-fold or dispose of proteins implicated in the disease.

Tohru Mizushima of Kumamoto University, Japan, and his colleagues used mice bred to mimic symptoms of Alzheimer’s. Half the mice were also engineered to make extra supplies of heat shock protein (HSP) 70 in their brains.

The HSP70-boosted mice were much better than the others at finding their way around mazes, and post-mortems showed their brains to be free of the characteristic beta-amyloid plaques that clog the brains of people with Alzheimer’s.

That’s because the boosted mice produced normal – rather than high – levels of the amyloid precursor proteins from which plaques are made. What’s more, any plaques that did form were more readily removed.


Mizushima’s team says that HSP70 amplifies the expression of chemicals such as insulin-degrading enzyme and transforming growth factor beta 1, linked to the destruction of the beta-amyloid proteins (Journal of Neuroscience, DOI: 10.1523/jneurosci.5478-10.2011).

Elsewhere in the field, Nature Genetics carries reports of four new genes linked with Alzheimer’s disease by consortia in the US (DOI: 10.1038/ng.801) and Europe (DOI: 10.1038/ng.803). These genetic discoveries reinforce earlier gene studies implicating abnormal inflammation and fat metabolism in the disease.