Parkinson’s disease in a dish: UB researchers reproduce brain oscillations that characterize the disease

The breakthrough could speed the development of new Parkinson’s treatments

“What we found in our new research is pretty dramatic. When we recorded electrical activity in the neurons with parkin mutations, you could clearly see the oscillations. ”

BUFFALO, N.Y. — Abnormal oscillations in neurons that control movement, which likely cause the tremors that characterize Parkinson’s disease, have long been reported in patients with the disease. Now, University at Buffalo researchers working with stem cells report that they have reproduced these oscillations in a petri dish, paving the way for much faster ways to screen for new treatments or even a cure for Parkinson’s disease.

The paper is published online today (May 2) in Cell Reports.

“With this new finding, we can now generate in a dish the neuronal misfiring that is similar to what occurs in the brain of a Parkinson’s patient,” said Jian Feng, PhD, senior author on the paper and professor in the Department of Physiology and Biophysics in the Jacobs School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences at UB. “A variety of studies and drug discovery efforts can be implemented on these human neurons to speed up the discovery of a cure for Parkinson’s disease.”

The work provides a useful platform for better understanding the molecular mechanisms at work in the disease, he added.

Rhythmic bursts

Abnormal brain oscillations first came to light decades ago when some Parkinson’s patients began undergoing deep brain stimulation as treatment once their medications ceased to be effective. Neurosurgeons doing the procedure noticed rhythmic bursts of activity or oscillations among neurons in patients when they used electrodes to override brain activity in order to stimulate the brain.

“Our bodies move because there is coordination between the contracting and relaxing of our muscles,” explained Feng. “It’s all exquisitely timed within the brain structure called basal ganglia.”

The rhythmic bursts of activity or oscillations that neurosurgeons saw in the brains of Parkinson’s patients signaled that something in that system had broken down but exactly how wasn’t clear.